Australian Nursing and Midwifery History Project

Bright Sparcs

What's the Federation Project?

The National Biographical Federation Project, known as the Federation Project was an initiative of the then named Australian Nursing History Project (ANHP) begun in May 2001 as a strategy to contribute nurses' names to the Bright Sparcs database.

Bright Sparcs, officially called the 'History of Australian Science and Technology Bibliography', is a database register of people who have contributed to the development of science, technology, engineering and medicine in Australia. The Federation Project, was devised to add nurses to the Bright Sparcs register.

The ANMHP provides world wide access to Australian nursing resources through the Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre (Austehc).

The Austehc Centre Web server is entirely dedicated to making available information about the history and heritage of science, medicine and technology from earliest records to the late twentieth century.

The Bright Sparcs database serves both as a community resource, providing biographical information and as a research tool by listing the sources of data - published, archival and online. The database receives numerous hits per week from an estimated 20,000 individuals, mostly senior secondary students. Education Departments in several states have formally embraced the Austehc Web-server infrastructure and it now forms part of the innovative Education Channel.

The nurses whose names appear on Bright Sparcs as an outcome of the Federation Project is gradually increasing. The Federation Project has won support from nursing organisations, past trainee associations, nurses boards and private individuals. For the names of nurses added to Bright Sparcs through the Federation Project and the people who sponsored their inclusion click here:

Both the NSW College of Nursing and the Royal College of Nursing Australia have pledged further support for the Project by adding the name of a nurse each year.