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Sylvia Hallsworth (right) grants a pin to a graduating nursing student during the 1999 commencement.

Over the course of her 30-year career as a Northern Essex Community College educator and nurse, Sylvia Hallsworth ’71 came to recognize a common trend among students on campus:

“No student ever did the academic journey alone.”

For so many students, she says, the educational journey was and is a team balancing act, and one that often prompts a range of tough questions: How will course schedules interfere with work schedules, caretaking duties, and personal wellness? How will degree costs be covered affordably? Too often in her career, Hallsworth watched as students’ outside financial responsibilities took precedence over education, forcing some to reduce their course load or drop out of school altogether.

Now, she hopes to put an end to that trend.

Earlier this year, Hallsworth, an assistant dean emerita of health professions at NECC, established the Dr. Sylvia G. Hallsworth Fund, an endowed fund which will dually support an annual scholarship award for eligible students and coverage of certain NECC healthcare program costs, including pins for graduating nursing students. The scholarship, available to any healthcare program student with a GPA of 3.0 or higher and with demonstrated financial need, will be distributed each fall beginning in 2026.

For Hallsworth, supporting NECC in this manner was simply “the natural thing to do” to help students in need.

“I contributed this donation in honor of all the students who want to become nurses and for some reason – maybe financial, maybe family-related – feel they can’t,” she explains. “I contributed so that students won’t have to make that tough choice going forward.”

Hallsworth, circa 1971

Hallsworth’s knowledge of student challenges comes firsthand. Her affiliation with NECC dates back to 1969, when she first stepped foot on campus as a member of NECC’s second nursing class. At that time, Hallsworth was working as an aid at local hospitals, having earned some credentials through a three-year nursing program, while managing a full-time course-load and responsibilities at home. Despite the difficult balance her schedule required, she went on to graduate in two years with the highest score in her class and soon after obtained a full-time role at Holy Family Hospital in Methuen.

From there, she says “nursing, and nursing education, became a passion. I knew this was it.”

Finding she loved higher education as much as she loved being a nurse, Hallsworth decided to return to NECC in 1975 – this time as an evening psychiatric nursing program instructor – while pursuing a bachelor’s degree at Lowell State College (now UMass Lowell) and later a master’s degree at Boston University, before eventually pursuing her doctorate. By the time she began teaching courses on campus, Hallsworth had already taught for several different types of nursing programs, including the BSN program at UMass Lowell and the three-year nursing diploma program at Lawrence General, and had come to realize something crucial: that a two-year nursing program could prove just as valuable as the traditional three-year program, and could get more nurses into the high-demand field faster.

Here, in NECC’s nursing department, she quickly made her mark demonstrating just that, providing guidance and leadership for all nurses who wished to excel in the young program.

By 1983, Hallsworth was the director for NECC’s registered nursing program, and by the 1990s played a foundational role in implementing and expanding healthcare program offerings on NECC’s Lawrence Campus. For her leadership contributions, she was granted an NECC Outstanding Alumni Award in 1995, and was appointed as a two-time chair and member of the Merrimack Valley Nursing Task Force, and as a member of the Governor’s Commission on Nursing. She retired from NECC as assistant dean of health professions in 2002, having mentored hundreds of students as they worked to achieve their dreams of working in the field that she has long loved.

Today, thanks to her new endowed fund, she’s continuing that legacy for hundreds more.

“For a lot of students, the dream of becoming a nurse starts early and is lifelong,” she says on her decision to give back. “If I can make it easier for someone to fulfill their dreams, then I want to do just that. It’s simply the best thing I can do for another person.”

NECC offers a variety of scholarships to eligible students each year thanks to the generosity of its donor community. Please view the NECC Scholarship Giving page to learn about endowed scholarship donation opportunities.