• Robin Knobel, a nurse from Greenville, North Carolina who is studying for her Ph.D. in Nursing at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  Ms. Knobel has been a nurse since 1981, working in the neonatal intensive care unit in several institutions as a neonatal nurse practitioner.  She has participated in important research studies about thermoregulation for extremely low birthweight infants and has made many contributions to nursing and to the health of premature babies. 
  
• Christie Lawrence, a nurse from Illinois who is pursuing a master's degree in maternal child nursing from the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Nursing.  Ms. Lawrence works at Rush University Medical Center facilitating a weekly Mother's Milk Club group comprised of an under-served, mostly minority population of new mothers, teaching women about the science of human milk and lactation, as well as strategies for breastfeeding.  Ms. Lawrence explains that becoming a teenage mother herself, she once had negative attitudes about breastfeeding.  She says that her education as a nurse has convinced her that educating other young African-American women about the importance of breastfeeding is essential.  
  
• Gina Novick, a nurse and certified nurse-midwife from Hamden, Connecticut, who is also pursuing a doctorate in Nursing Science from Yale University.  Ms. Novick first earned a bachelor's degree in Russian before beginning her nursing career in 1980.  She is drawn to the policy arena in health care, as evidenced by her role as a founding member of the Board of Directors for the Centering Pregnancy and Parenting Foundation, and as the co-founder of the Birth Center Task Force, a “think tank” advocacy group. 
  
• Bridget Robinson, a nurse from Trenton, Missouri, who is attending the University of Kansas to become a certified nurse-midwife.  Ms. Robinson has been a nurse for six years and is dedicated to helping women and infants in rural communities where health care providers are scarce.  When she graduates, Ms. Robinson will become the first midwife in her northern Missouri community, where she hopes to ensure that more women can receive obstetric care where they live.  Ms. Robinson currently works in a hospital obstetrics unit and is active in the local March of Dimes chapter. 

Qualified applicants for the March of Dimes nursing scholarships are registered nurses currently enrolled in a graduate program in maternal-child nursing at the masters or doctorate level.  Applicants should be a member of the American College of Nurse-Midwives, the Association of Women's Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses, or the National Association of Neonatal Nurses.  Applications for the 2005 scholarships will be available this fall on the March of Dimes Web site at www.marchofdimes.com/nursing, or by calling the March of Dimes at (914) 997-4609.  Applications for 2005 scholarships are due January 17, 2005.