Ensign Sandra Parker-Ansah raises her right hand as Mark Boman, chief of staff for Naval Medical Forces Pacific, administers the auth of office during Parker-Ansah’s commissioning ceremony at the NMFP headquarters, Aug. 2. Parker-Ansah was commissioned as a Naval officer in the Navy Chaplain Corps. She aims to bridge healthcare and chaplaincy in the Navy, leveraging her background as a registered nurse and her advanced degrees in healthcare administration and divinity. Hailing from Ghana, Parker-Ansah graduated from Accra Girls Senior High School, Accra Region, Ghana, in 2008, a bustling institution with a student body of approximately 10,000. Her academic pursuits took her to the London School of Business and Finance in the United Kingdom, where she earned a degree in economics and statistics in 2012. She further honed her skills and knowledge at Duke University, graduating in 2016 with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. By 2018, she had completed a Master of Business Administration in Healthcare Administration from Emory University and is currently on track to graduate from Liberty University in 2025 with a Master of Divinity, focusing on Military Chaplaincy. “Some folks who know my background are asking why a nurse would want to be a chaplain,” she said. “To those folks I say, when God calls, all you have to do is answer.” (U.S. Navy photo by Arsenio R. Cortez Jr.)