UF nursing dean named associate provost

Kathleen Long, Ph.D., R.N., F.A.A.N., dean of the University of Florida College of Nursing, has been named the university's associate provost. She will serve in the role on a half-time basis and will remain dean.

Long will address policy and practice in areas such as sabbaticals, professional accreditations, teaching requirements and clinical practice relationships. In addition, she will help develop approaches for a three-year, $2 million program to expand faculty educational enhancement opportunities that UF President Bernie Machen announced last month.

Long also will help provide an interface between UF's academic affairs office and the Health Science Center, and will serve as the provost's representative in universitywide efforts to develop a new budget model.

Long has been nursing dean since 1995, holding the longest tenure among current Health Science Center deans. In that time she has won national recognition as a leading thinker about the future of the nursing profession in a rapidly changing health-care landscape especially threatened by a shortage of nurses. She has been an invited member of several national task forces focused on interdisciplinary education, health professions shortage issues and patient safety.

Long has served several terms on the board of directors of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing and was AACN's president from 2002 to 2004. She was a member of the AACN Task Force that authored "Nursing Education's Agenda for the 21st Century."

Long received her bachelor of science in nursing degree from Catholic University of America and her master of science in nursing in child psychiatric/nursing education at Wayne State University. She earned her Ph.D. in behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins University. She served as dean of the Montana State University College of Nursing prior to coming to UF.

Long's research has focused on child and family mental health, rural health and innovations in nursing education. She has been elected to membership in Phi Beta Kappa as well as Sigma Theta Tau, Phi Kappa Phi and Delta Omega. She is a fellow of the American Academy of Nursing and a life fellow of the American Orthopsychiatric Association.