Meet our DNP Faculty
Faculty in Vanderbilt’s DNP program will be doctorally-prepared, predominantly those who are actively practicing APNs. Specific qualifications reflect the course responsibilities. Faculty will be actively engaged in their own scholarly projects. Our core faculty are listed below. Additional faculty will be teaching in the DNP program and serving as advisors.
Donna Behler McArthur, PhD, FNP-BC, FAANP
DNP Program Director
Professor of Nursing
BSN – University of Maryland at Baltimore
MSN (Family Nurse Practitioner) – Vanderbilt University
School of Nursing
PhD (Nursing) – University of Maryland at Baltimore
Dr. McArthur has 40 years experience within nursing, including 30 years as a Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP), an NP educator and an administrator within ambulatory health care settings in the United States and the Middle East. She received her Master of Science in Nursing degree in the FNP specialty from Vanderbilt University School of Nursing and her PhD from the University of Maryland. Her scholarly activities embrace nurse practitioner education and practice with ethnically diverse and vulnerable populations across the lifespan. Prior to her current position, she was a clinical professor at the University of Arizona College of Nursing and Director of the DNP Program there. She maintains an Adjunct Clinical Professor position within that institution. Previously, Dr. McArthur was Director of the FNP Program at Vanderbilt University School of Nursing, during which time she was awarded a Robert Wood Johnson grant to participate in a national program to develop a model for educating NP students in a managed-care setting. In 2006 she was awarded the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners Foundation/Endo Pharmaceuticals Grant for her research study, Pain Perception in Adults with ALS. At present, her practice and community activities are focused on initiatives surrounding this disease. She was one of the first NPs to be inducted as a Fellow into the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners.
Linda D. Norman, DSN, RN, FAAN
Senior Associate Dean for Academics
Professor of Nursing
BSN & MSN (Adult Health) – University of Virginia
DSN – University of Alabama at Birmingham
Dr. Norman has been involved in nursing education for 32 years, serving in administrative positions for the past 22 years, 16 of which have been at Vanderbilt University School of Nursing as the Associate Dean of Academics and most recently as co-coordinator of the PhD in Nursing program. She has also been actively involved in the area of continuous quality improvement for the past 12 years, serving on the advisory committee for the Interdisciplinary Professional Education Collaborative and the Kitchen Cabinet for Professional Education of the Institute for Health Care Improvement (IHI). She is a founding member of IHI's Summer Institute for Leadership in Quality Improvement for Health Professional Educators. She serves on the research team to evaluate the effectiveness of the Johnson and Johnson Media Campaign related to the nursing shortage. She developed the evaluation component for several curricula and education projects using a continual improvement framework. Most recently, she developed the evaluation/improvement process for the National Health Professional Preparedness Consortium curriculum for mass casualty and is the evaluator for an AHRQ bioterrorism educational project grant. In addition, she serves on the executive committee of the International Nursing Coalition for Mass Casualty Education. She has been recognized for her expertise and knowledge of nursing education and quality improvement, as evidenced by her induction into the American Academy of Nursing in 2004. She is a past member of the Health Resource Service Agency National Advisory Committee on Nursing Education and Practice and currently serves on the National League for Nursing Accreditation Commission's Review Panel. She was invited to serve as a member of the research team to evaluate the impact of the Johnson & Johnson Nursing Media Campaign. She is active in international nursing activities, recently being named co-chair of the NLN/NLNAC Global Education Task Force.
Bonnie Pilon, DSN, RN, BC, FAAN
Senior Associate Dean for Practice
Professor of Nursing, Health Systems Management
BS (Nursing) – Barry University, Miami, FL
MSN – University of Florida, Gainesville
DSN – University of Alabama at Birmingham
Dr. Pilon has held the Associate Dean at Vanderbilt School of Nursing position since 1999; she co-directs the Health Systems Management academic program. She has held a number of leadership positions in health care, including Chief Nursing Officer for a 500-bed tertiary hospital, senior consultant for IBM and manager in a proprietary health care company. Dr. Pilon is currently serving the first of a two-year term as Chair of the National Nursing Centers Consortium and her final year as Chair of the Case Management Administrators Credentialing Board. She is active in state and national professional organizations. She has conducted research in nursing administration and health systems management, authored numerous publications, and serves as a national and international consultant in case management and nursing administration.
Mary Jo Gilmer, PhD, MBA, RN
Director, Clinical Management Program
Professor of Nursing
BSN – Michigan State University
MSN – University of Illinois; MBA- Queens University
PhD – University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Dr. Gilmer began her career in nursing at Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, while she completed her MSN degree at the University of Illinois. She worked as a Clinical Specialist in Pediatric Cardiovascular Surgery before receiving a Commonwealth Fund Executive Nurse Fellowship to pursue an MBA at Queens University. Before coming to Vanderbilt, Dr. Gilmer was on the faculty at Queens University from 1983–1998. Throughout her career, she has received numerous awards for her research and teaching expertise: National Co-Alliance for Teaching Excellence Award; Great 100, North Carolina Foundation for Nursing Award; Sigma Theta Research Award; McColl Faculty Research Award; Julia Hereford Teaching Award; and Excellence in Teaching Award from Educational Resources, Inc. and Outstanding Faculty Award at Vanderbilt. She has been a leader in several international health care projects, including initiatives in Belize, Uganda, China, Italy and Ecuador. Beginning in 2002, Dr. Gilmer's research and practice has focused on enhancing care of children with life-threatening conditions. Her work at Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital has involved establishment of an interdisciplinary team to develop: 1) research initiatives, 2) clinical services in palliative care, 3) education and training and 4) support services. Dr. Gilmer is currently Director of the Pediatric Advanced Comfort Team, site PI of a NIH-funded Parent-Sibling Bereavement study and a co-investigator with another NIH proposal focused on Parent-Child Communication about cancer. She serves on the Initiative for Pediatric Palliative Care (IPPC) faculty and has been invited to present internationally about palliative care.
Randolph F. R. Rasch, PhD, RN, FNP, FAANP
Director, Family Nurse Practitioner Program
Professor of Nursing
BSN – Andrews University, Michigan
MSN (Family Nurse Practitioner) – Vanderbilt School of Nursing
PhD (Nursing) – University of Texas, Austin
Dr. Rasch has been the Director of the FNP Program at Vanderbilt for five years. Prior to this appointment, he was the Coordinator of the Family Nurse Practitioner Program in the School of Nursing at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Before beginning his work in nursing education, Dr. Rasch worked in the Tennessee Department of Corrections as a nurse practitioner, health administrator and as the first Director of Nursing Services for the Department. Dr. Rasch has done research in the areas of men’s health, HIV risk reduction in substance users and the information needs of nurse practitioners. He is currently involved with an interdisciplinary team exploring health and social outcomes of individuals involved in a faith-based, community program whose goals are the reduction risk of HIV infection, providing case management and care for injecting and non-injecting drug users. Dr Rasch is currently a member of the editorial board of Public Health Nursing and serves on a variety of national and local professional and community boards. He is a Fellow in the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners.
Betsy Weiner, PhD, RN, BC, FAAN
Senior Associate Dean for Educational Informatics
Professor of Nursing and Biomedical Informatics
BSN – University of Kentucky
MSN – University of Cincinnati
PhD (Nursing) – University of Kentucky
Considered a pioneer in multimedia development (with 25 years of development experience in the health sciences), Dr. Weiner is responsible for the distance learning programs in nursing and the informatics tools that help tie together the research, practice and academic arenas. Prior to joining Vanderbilt in 2000, she served 21 years at the University of Cincinnati which included 10 years as director for a university-wide faculty technology center and four years as director of university academic computing. Dr. Weiner also coordinates the school’s efforts in leading the International Nursing Coalition for Mass Casualty Education as the Associate Director. In this role, she participated in the development of a five-year strategic plan for the Department of Health and Human Services to deliver a national curriculum to health care providers for mass casualty education. Her current research interests evolve around issues related to online learning for emergency preparedness. In addition, she is investigating the implementation of informatics competencies for advanced practice nurses. Dr. Weiner has served at all levels of leadership in Sigma Theta Tau over the years and promoted informatics solutions. As a new member of the American Academy of Nursing in 1998, she built the ListServ for the American Academy for Nursing, pulling that organization into the technology arena for communication. She is active in the American Medical Informatics Association, and served in 2001–03 as Secretary to the Nursing Informatics Working Group. She has received an Alumnae Award for Excellence in Nursing Education from the University of Kentucky and numerous other awards for multimedia projects.
Mary Dietrich, PhD, MS
Research Associate Professor of Nursing, Statistician
Assistant Professor of Medicine, Psychiatry
BS (Psychology) – Bethel College, Kansas
MS (Psychology) – Ft. Hays University, Kansas
PhD (Statistics & Measurement) – Vanderbilt University
Dr. Dietrich has been at Vanderbilt School of Nursing since January 2006. She holds an adjunct Assistant Professorship appointment in the School of Medicine (Psychiatry). Prior to joining the School of Nursing, Dr. Dietrich was a statistical consultant for the central research services at Vanderbilt University for more than 15 years, serving all central University schools and departments while increasingly focusing on bio-behavioral statistical consulting leading to federally-funded research studies. Her doctoral work, titled “Parental Functioning and Developmental Outcome: A multi-Method Study of the Constructs and Their Relationship,” earned her the Hardy C. Wilcoxon Award from the Department of Psychology and Human Development for most distinguished doctoral dissertation in any area of psychology inquiry. Dr. Dietrich's extensive experience with techniques used to measure and analyze complex multi-dimensional systems and outcomes spans a wide variety of intervention protocols, including community-based development programs. Her collaborative work has been published in a variety of refereed journals. Dr. Dietrich's own research interests center around the measurement of, and assessment of changes in, psycho-social developing systems – in particular early infant development systems (both normative, as well as those characterized by failure-to-thrive, neglect and/or abuse).
Joan E. King, PhD, RNC, ACNP, ANP
Director, Acute Care Nurse Practitioner Program
Associate Professor of Nursing
BSN/MSN – Vanderbilt University School of Nursing
PhD (Higher Education Administration) – George Peabody
College for Teachers
Dr. Joan King is a certified Acute Care Nurse Practitioner who assisted in writing the first national ACNP certification exam. She practices at the Pre-Anesthesia Evaluation Clinic at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and has played a primary role in the development of Vanderbilt’s Acute Care Nurse Practitioner specialty program. She recently received funding from HRSA for the development and implementation of the FNP/ACNP-ED specialty program. Her research includes smoking cessation, treatment of adult diabetic ketoacidosis and the correlation of urine, blood and rectal temperatures in critically ill patients. Results of these studies have been published in such journals as: American Journal of the Medical Sciences, Western Journal of Nursing Research and Journal of Applied Social Psychology.
Susan M. Adams, PhD, APRN, BC
Director, Psych Mental Health Nurse Practitioner Program
Associate Professor of Nursing
BSN – Valparaiso University, Indiana
MSN – University of California, San Francisco
PhD (Nursing) – University of Kentucky
Dr. Adams is dually certified as a Clinical Specialist in Adult Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing and as a Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurse Practitioner. She was an item writer for the first national certification exam for Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurse Practitioners offered by ANCC (Fall 2000). She joined the faculty at Vanderbilt University School of Nursing in 1995, provided leadership in developing the PMHNP curriculum, and implementing the modified distance option for the PMHNP program. She recently authored a chapter on evidence-based practice for nurses. She has extensive experience in group and family therapy from Palo Alto VAMC in California, which she integrates into experiential learning within the classroom. She has pioneered an advanced practice role with a private OB-Gyn group in Brentwood, TN, where she provides psychiatric consultation and psychotherapy for selected clients. Her research interests include affective disorders in women and the role of hope in the depression recovery process. Recent articles have been published in the Journal of Psychosocial Nursing and Mental Health Services; Nursing and Health Care: Perspectives on Community; and Nursing Administration Quarterly.
Jim Pace, DSN, MDiv, APRN, BC, FAANP
Coordinator, ANP/Palliative Care Focus
Professor of Nursing
BSN – Florida State University
MSN/MDiv – Vanderbilt University
DNS – University of Alabama at Birmingham
Dr. Pace is the coordinator of the Adult Nurse Practitioner Program with a palliative care focus which was recently awarded a three year advanced education nursing grant by DHHS, the Health Resources and Services Administration. Dr. Pace holds a BSN from Florida State, MSN and MDiv degrees from Vanderbilt, and a DSN from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Dr. Pace is a board certified adult nurse practitioner. Dr. Pace's research and scholarly activities lie in the areas of spirituality/religion and health, palliative/hospice care, and HIV/AIDS and spirituality. Dr. Pace is also an Episcopal priest who serves as a part-time evening chaplain for Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
Clare Thomson-Smith, MSN, RN, JD
Director, Center for Advanced Practice Nursing
and Allied Health (CAPNAH)
Assistant Professor of Nursing
BSN – Cumberland University, Tennessee
MSN (FNP & Post-Master’s Health Systems Management) –
Vanderbilt University School of Nursing
JD – Vanderbilt University Law School
Professor Thomson-Smith is currently a member of the VUMC leadership team, responsible for regulatory oversight, evolving practice models, billing practices, and credentialing of over 450 allied health professionals to include APNs. In this role she is able to combine her clinical, administrative, and legal experiences. Professor Thomson-Smith has assumed international leadership roles within nursing to include nine years in the Middle East. Her APN roles have been those of midwife and FNP. Her law clerkships included the United Nations in New York with Peacekeeping Operations and UNICEF.