Lisa Levack knew when she was a teenager that she wanted to serve her country.
Growing up in a small town in New York, Lisa wasn’t ready for college immediately after graduating high school. Instead, she enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1999—following the path of her two older brothers, who served in the Navy and the Army. “The Marines was everything I wanted, and I absolutely loved it,” says Lisa, who was an FA-18 aviation mechanic.
A Transition to the Army
After five years of service in the Marines, Lisa’s stepfather became ill. She wanted to be there for her family after being stationed all over the world and moved to Pennsylvania, where her parents had moved. “I was waiting tables because there were no other job opportunities in my profession close to home, but my stepfather was the one to tell me I needed to get back into the military,” she recalls.
Fortunately, Lisa had the opportunity to join the Army as a recruiter and transportation non-commissioned officer. She earned a promotion to Sergeant First Class and then to transportation warrant officer. While deployed in Kuwait, she earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration in 2010.
Like Mother, Like Daughter
By 2011, Lisa was married with two young children, and she made a career decision for her family. “My husband was active duty too, and we wanted one of us to be home with our children if the other one deployed,” she says. So, she went into the Army Reserves. That year, she and her husband were driving to Georgia, his next duty station, and Lisa had an epiphany. “I told him, ‘I want to become a nurse.’ My mom was a nurse, and I never thought I would be, but I loved the idea of caring for people and wearing the uniform. It seemed like what I wanted to do!”
After a move from Georgia to North Carolina in 2012, Lisa started on her path to nursing. She was accepted into nursing school and then received orders to deploy to Afghanistan. She was finally able to start nursing school one year later. Lisa earned the Associate Degree of Nursing at Sandhills Community College in 2016 and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing online in 2017.
A Start in the Hospital
In 2016, Lisa started her nursing career at Cape Fear Valley Hospital on the medical-surgical floor. She transitioned later into the neonatal intensive care unit. Moves to Georgia and Texas broadened Lisa’s experience, and in 2019, she went on active duty in the Army and landed at Brook Army Medical Center in the surgical trauma intensive care unit.
For the next two years, Lisa worked long shifts to handle the overflow of COVID patients from the civilian population as well as military patients. When things settled down in 2022, she was moved to the cardiac and vascular intensive care unit. “That’s when I started thinking about returning to school for a master’s degree in nursing,” Lisa says. “I’ll be retiring from the military at some point soon, and I wanted to make myself more marketable as a civilian nurse. I wanted to expand my knowledge and develop my nursing leadership.” In 2023, she was selected to be the officer in charge of a 28-bed intermediate medical unit.
Finding Post University and Starting the Master of Science in Nursing – Nursing Management and Organizational Leadership Specialization
Lisa began researching online Master of Science in Nursing in Nursing Management and Organizational Leadership programs and found American Sentinel College of Nursing and Health Sciences at Post University. “Post does an amazing job for their active-duty military students, offering so much support as well as tuition assistance,” she says. Although affordability got her in the door, Lisa says she was pleased with her professors and student success advisor. “My advisor made it so easy to get help when you need it, and the teachers were all wonderful. Every single person I’ve worked with at Post University has been phenomenal.”
Lisa, who earned her MSN in the fall 2024, is planning for her next life chapter: retirement from the military. “I am ready to see what that next stage of my career brings,” she says. Her perspective as a military member has broadened her scope and taught her that nurses need a seat at the table to advocate for themselves in the hospitals and other facilities where they work. “People inspire me to be a better leader and make things better for our nurses, who do what they do because they truly care. I am all about being a voice and a change agent for them. And I know that this MSN degree gives me more opportunities to do that.”