Nursing college taps Texan for new dean
A Texas nursing administrator with a long and lucrative history of research grants has been named the new dean of the Washington State Intercollegiate College of Nursing.
Robert L. Anders has received national grants totaling nearly $6 million in the past few years, according to the resume of the University of Texas at El Paso professor.
It’s that kind of vision and energy that convinced a search committee that Anders is the right person to lead Spokane’s cooperative nursing school to a new level of national prominence.
“He will be a connector, a networker in involving many of his faculty in research,” said Brian Pitcher, the WSU chancellor who was part of the search team that chose Anders. “With his experience, he can bring a professional perspective from a national level. … This is a very good hire for the college and the community.”
Anders is an associate dean and college of health science professor and director of the nursing school at UTEP. He will replace Dorothy M. Detlor, who plans to retire Sept. 15.
Detlor said that she decided to step down after nearly nine years because it’s a pivotal time for the school, which educates about 900 upper-division and graduate-level nurses.
The institution is poised to add its first-ever Ph.D. program and vastly expand research programs. Groundbreaking is scheduled this fall for the new $34.6 million Riverpoint campus in Spokane. Organizers expect to be able to admit and serve more students, a move that will help address a nationwide nursing shortage expected to top 275,000 by 2010.
“With all that, it’s time for a change,” Detlor said this week.
Detlor will leave her $180,000-a-year post to work half time for the college, focusing on development, legislation and consulting.
Anders, who will earn $198,500 annually, is expected to expand efforts to attract high-quality faculty to the institution, largely by wooing them with promises of research potential – and the funding that follows. Anders is a clinical nurse specialist in psychiatric mental health nursing who has conducted extensive research on health care outcomes for the mentally ill.
He has received recent grants that include a nearly $675,000 grant from the Health Services Resources Administration, a nearly $460,000 grant from the Tenet Foundation and a $4.1 million grant from the National Institutes of Health.
“He had led the development of significant research activity with his faculty at UT El Paso,” Pitcher said.
Detlor said she’s proud of her work to increase awareness of the school, which claims it is the nation’s “first, oldest and most comprehensive nursing education consortium.” The College of Nursing offers classes through partnerships with Eastern Washington University, Gonzaga University, Washington State University and Whitworth College.
“When I came here, this college had been in the community since 1968, and I’d run into people who didn’t know who we were,” Detlor recalled. “We’ve helped the college become more visible and to establish itself as a leader in nursing in this community.”