Jazmine Nicdao-Labilles works more than 20 hours a week as a nurse at PeaceHealth in Vancouver, Wash., while also caring for her immunocompromised mother; raising a daughter, now 5, with her husband, Jobail; and attending graduate school at WSU Vancouver. She graduated in May with a Doctor of Nursing Practice degree.
Ask her the secret to balancing work, school and family.
"I have help from my family, of course. And I love writing and scheduling my life in a planner. I need to have the time, dates, exactly what I need to do, and my planner helps me a lot." If it's there in writing, nothing can fall through the cracks.
As for self-discipline, "I limit the time I spend on social media and gatherings. That means I've lost some relationships," she said.
For Jazmine Nicdao-Labilles, setting goals, self-discipline, and asking for help along the way are keys to success.
Getting everything done depends on the help of her husband, her parents and her sister. "I write the schedule so my whole family will see it," she explained. "If Mom has labs or a doctor's appointment, I write down who will take her. I'm her primary contact when it comes to medical needs, so there are also a lot of phone calls. My husband is a nurse, too. He works the night shift at Multnomah County Jail, and I work the day shift, so we can keep up on who's going to take care of our daughter. I do my schooling while I take care of her. And I always bring my computer so I can do my schooling everywhere."
"Throughout her program, she has beautifully balanced school and work," said her advisor, Angela C. Brittain, clinical assistant professor in the WSU College of Nursing. "She has a tremendous amount of grit tempered with grace."
A dream since childhood
Jazmine Nicdao was a 9-year-old girl in the Philippines when she lost her father to diabetes. "From that point, I knew I'd be a nurse," she said.
Her mother, Lucia, wasn't well either, and Jazmine and her older sister, Charito ("she's like a second mother to me"), helped take care of their parents. Jazmine remembers learning to cook basic things at age 6. She was self-disciplined at an early age, and both sisters worked whenever they could—housekeeping for a friend, for example—to help support the family while trying to keep up with school.
When her mother remarried, Jazmine and Charito became close to their stepfather, Michael Payne. Jazmine finished high school and completed two years of college in the Philippines.
Payne, who had grown up in Portland, felt the whole family would be better off in the United States, with a better medical system, a better chance for an education and a better standard of living. "I was depressed about leaving the Philippines and losing friends," Jazmine said. But he was persuasive, and in 2011, they moved to Vancouver, where he had a house. Jazmine went back and forth for a while but finally moved permanently in 2013.
Things indeed began looking up. Notably, Jazmine was on her way to a doctorate, and, in 2023, her mother, Lucia, was able to get a life-saving liver transplant at OHSU.
The dream comes true
Her stepfather urged Jazmine not to give up her dream of becoming a nurse. After a lot of discouragement (some colleges wanted her to start over earning high school credits), she enrolled at Clark College and completed her A.A. degree in nursing in 2015. She worked as a Certified Nursing Assistant in home care while continuing her education at Western Governors University, an online school.
She married Jobail Labilles in 2017 and they bought their house in Vancouver in 2018. Their daughter, Athena Miranda Labilles, was born in 2019—the year Jazmine completed her bachelor's degree.
The following year she began applying to WSU Vancouver's DNP program. In 2021, she landed a job at PeaceHealth. She was on the waiting list for the DNP program when another student backed out and the position went to Jazmine.
PeaceHealth has been supportive, awarding her a scholarship to continue her education and accommodating her schedule so she could work part-time. Outside of work hours, she collaborated with PeaceHealth nursing staff on her DNP special project, which involves educating patients to reduce falls and increase mobility.
"There are lots of opportunities in America that other countries don't have," Nicdao-Labilles said. Grants and scholarships helped her complete her education. "In the Philippines, it would be out-of-pocket for everything."
And what would she like to tell other students who find themselves inundated with too much to do?
"Self-discipline and being proactive played a major role in my success," she said. "When I feel lazy, I think about the consequences"—e.g., not studying can result in low grades. "Don't be scared of asking for help," she added. "Sometimes pride gets in our way. My family is what really helped me. Help gives you opportunities to do what you need to do and set your mind on what you want to achieve. If you set your mind on a goal, you can get your small tasks done while achieving that goal. One step at a time."