The Dean of ASU’s College of Nursing and Health Innovation will leave her post later this year for a position at Ohio State University.
Bernadette Melnyk will take on the roles of associate vice president for health promotion, university chief wellness officer and dean of the College of Nursing at OSU in September. Melnyk said she was not looking to leave ASU when OSU reached out to her.
“I got recruited very heavily by OSU,” Melnyk said. “The opportunity I have to impact a university at a university level rather than just the college level was very exciting for me.”
Melnyk’s decision comes just weeks after College of Public Programs Dean Debra Friedman announced she will be leaving ASU at the start of July for an administrative job at the University of Washington Tacoma. Friedman is also the university vice president of the Downtown campus. Along with Christopher Callahan, dean of the Walter Cronkite School, Melnyk and Friedman are two of the three deans of the major colleges located on the Downtown campus.
Melnyk has received two prestigious “Edge Runner” awards from the American Academy of Nursing and is considered an expert on child and adolescent mental health by many in her field. She earned her Ph.D. in clinical nursing research from the University of Rochester in 1992.
College spokesman Terry Olbrysh said that since Melnyk has been the dean the College of Nursing has become one of the top-rated nursing colleges in the country at a university without a medical school.
“It’s a loss for the college,” Olbrysh said. “She’s done a superb job for six years, and the program she’s built and the culture are remarkable. She’s a very inspiring and popular leader.”
The graduate program in the college is ranked in the top 4 percent of 467 colleges in the 2012 U.S. News & World Report College Rankings.
“Dean Melnyk has provided the vision, impetus and resources ASU Nursing has needed to move into front running positions among U.S. Colleges,” said Colleen Keller, professor at the College of Nursing at ASU.
Keller said the college should continue with Melnyk’s vision as “the faculty and staff are infused with her role modeling of leadership and delivery.”
“I hope the college is able to sustain all the wonderful momentum that we currently have,” Melnyk said. “Our rankings are the highest they’ve ever been.”
Melnyk has also made connections with the faculty and students at the college and said she will miss them greatly.
“It’s bittersweet,” Melnyk said. “I’m very excited about the opportunity about making a bigger impact, but at the same time I’m very sad about leaving the organization and people I care about so deeply.”
Olbrysh said Melnyk will stay in place as the dean for the summer while the college tries to find someone to replace her.
“We wish her well certainly in her new challenges at OSU and she has limitless optimism that we hope she infects Ohio State with,” Olbrysh said.
Contact the reporter at alancial@asu.edu
