Newton Falls native Jeanne Bryner recently received the Daniel J. Pesut Spirit of Renewal Award from Sigma, the International Nurse Honor Society, at Sigma’s biannual convention in Indianapolis.

She earned a diploma degree in 1979 at Trumbull Memorial Hospital School of Nursing and a bachelor’s degree in 1996 from Kent State University’s Honors College. She was born in Appalachia and grew up in Newton Falls.

Her nursing career led her to reflective writing, research concerning historical and contemporary nurses, and utilization of the arts for healing. She also conducted workshops with school-age children, cancer survivors and elders in assisted living facilities, and started a Nurse Honor Guard with funding from Delta Xi, her home chapter of the Sigma, the International Nurse Honor Society.

The four-day convention was attended by 2,000 nurses who shared and celebrated nursing’s global advancement of knowledge, teaching, learning tools, service through community practice, education and research projects.

The Daniel J. Pesut Spirit of Renewal Award is given to a nurse leader “whose efforts to renew self and others exemplify purposeful reflection in practice, mindful understanding of human relationship and display an appreciative futuristic vision for the practice of nursing.”

Jacqueline K. Owens, Ph.D., RN, CNE, Professor Emerita, Ashland University Schar College of Nursing and Health Sciences, and Editor-in-Chief of OJIN: The Online Journal of Issues in Nursing nominated Bryner for the award. Dr. Owens is also a graduate of Trumbull Memorial Hospital School of Nursing.

Writing from Bryner’s breast cancer survivors was selected for a national anthology, Uplift, and the Healing Collage created by these women was a permanent part of Trumbull Memorial Hospital’s art collection. She has a deep respect for the healing power of language and under this mantra, teaches, writes and advocates for this evidence-based practice.

She is the author of 11 books, eight of which are poetry.

Bryner has received writing fellowships from Bucknell, the Ohio Arts Council (’97, ’07) and Vermont Studio Center. She has been a visiting artist / writer-in-residence / lecturer at OSU, Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Hiram College, West Virginia University, West Liberty University, University of Edinburgh in Scotland and others. She considers her greatest professional achievements as recovering nurses’ lives, facilitating the voices of her writing students and partnering with her Sigma chapter, Delta Xi, to initiate a Nurse Honor Guard for her community.

The mother of two children, she lives near a dairy farm with her husband, David.