The students at the University of Tennessee at Martin are often called to serve. The need to help others is what guides them to their chosen profession as nurses, doctors, law enforcement officers or areas of community service, among other options.
Rita Eimer (pronounced “EYE-mer”) has always wanted to be a nurse, and when she graduates, she will take her desire to serve a step further as an active-duty Army officer.
“Serving in the military had been on my mind for a while, but I also knew that I wanted to be a nurse,” she said. “I just didn’t know how to do both of those things.
“I always had a huge interest in Clara Barton and reading about World War II nurses. The things that they did really interested me. As a nurse, it’s all about taking care of people, so I wanted to be able – for at least a part of my career – to take care of the people who serve our country.”
Eimer is a senior nursing major from Hillsboro, Missouri, and is a graduate of St. Pius X High School. She is the daughter of Steve and Karen Eimer and is a four-year member of the UTM cross country and track and field teams.
Eimer has been in the UT Martin ROTC for three years and will be commissioned on May 2, 2025, to the rank of second lieutenant just days before she graduates from UT Martin.
“I have had many family members serve our country, including my dad, uncles and cousins,” she said. “Also, my sister is currently enlisted in the United States Air Force.
“I am so grateful for the sacrifices that they and other service members have made, and I feel that this is a way that I can kind of repay them for what they do or have done for our freedom.”
After being commissioned, Eimer must pass the National Council Licensure Examination, known as NCLEX, to become a nurse. Then, she would attend the Basic Officer Leader Course, a 10-week course held in San Antonio, Texas.
“Then, I would be assigned to my first duty station,” she said.
According to Lt. Col. Bernard House, professor of military science and the chair of the Department of Military Science, the Army Nurses Corps consists of more than 11,000 soldiers.
He added that Eimer is a Distinguished Military Graduate, ranking among the top 20% of cadets in the U.S. Army Cadet Command.
“The Army Nurse Corps provides unmatched health care to military members, families and retirees all over the world while also supporting humanitarian missions and responding to natural disasters,” House said. “Army nurses can be found at any medical installation in the military community, from managing hospital units to caring for service members and their families in the intensive care unit to providing primary care services in the ambulatory setting as a family nurse practitioner.
“Nurses work at mobile combat support hospitals, installation hospitals such as Madigan Army Center at Joint Base Lewis-McChord (in Washington state) or places like Walter Reed National Medical Center. As a second lieutenant, Rita will have a tremendous number of opportunities to travel the world and experience new things while serving as a nurse.”
Eimer said she is unsure now about whether or not she wants to be a career Army nurse, but she is keeping that door open.
“We’ll see where it takes me,” she said. “The Army has so many opportunities that I could pursue.”
Eimer said she wanted to pursue nursing because she has always been interested in how the body works. She said a couple of her aunts were also nurses, and they helped to guide her on her career path.
“Nursing has always been something that I’ve wanted to do,” she said. “I used to want to be a labor-and-delivery nurse or neonatal nurse. Over the summer, I had the opportunity to go in there and watch some of that – I’m in that class right now – and I don’t think I want to do labor and delivery anymore.
“I am more interested in critical care, like in an intensive-care unit or an emergency room. I’ve thought about flight nursing a little bit.”
Every ROTC cadet has to attend cadet summer training after their third year in ROTC, an advanced camp for 35 days. Eimer attended that training and then took part in a nurse summer training program at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Washington, D.C.
“It was basically an internship,” she said of working at the famed hospital once known as the flagship of Army hospitals. “I got to see what it would be like to be a nurse in the Army. They took us to a different unit every day we were there.
“It was a clinical experience. We would have a different preceptor every day, depending on the unit we were on. We would get to do the skills that we were allowed to do. There are certain things that nursing students weren’t allowed to do, like give blood or give IV magnesium and things like that. But, we were able to do basic patient care needs, IV starts, blood draws and so on.”
Dr. Mary Radford, professor of nursing and chair of the Department of Nursing, said Eimer is among the top students in this year’s class of 39 graduating nursing students, with 31 of those coming from the UTM main campus and eight coming from the UTM Parsons Center.
“Rita has been a standout of this graduating class,” she said. “I have always felt that the athletes that we get in the nursing program succeed because they’re so disciplined, anyway. Rita has discipline not only from athletics but also from being in ROTC. She is doubly-disciplined to achieve. She is a very hard worker.
“You will see her here after hours working on something when there may not be another person in the building who is working on anything. She is very professional and mature, and will be a great nurse for the Army.”
Service to one’s community or country can take many different forms and paths. Rita Eimer has been able to combine two paths of service as a means of serving her country and serving the health needs of people.
PHOTO: Rita Eimer, a senior nursing major at UT Martin from Hillsboro, Missouri, will double down on her desire to serve by being a nurse and serving in the Army.
