A Georgia Southern University dean is about to get a significant promotion.
    University President Brooks Keel has named Jean Bartels, the dean of the College of Health and Human Sciences, to be Georgia Southern’s next provost and vice president for academic affairs. Bartels, who will serve a three-year appointment, will begin her new role on July 1.
    She will succeed Ted Moore, who announced his resignation last week.
    Bartels has served as the Health and Human Services dean since April 2011. She earlier served as interim provost and vice president for academic affairs from July 2010 to April 2011. She also served as the chairwoman of the School of Nursing from 1999 to 2010, during which she led the nursing program to a level of national prominence documented by its consistent ranking by U.S. News & World Report as one of the top schools of nursing in the country. 
     “I am excited to appoint Jean Bartels to this important position at Georgia Southern University. She has earned the respect of her colleagues and is a highly sought consultant on curriculum and higher education across the nation.  She has risen through the faculty ranks and has demonstrated an impressive commitment to our students,” Keel said. “I am confident that Jean has the knowledge, talents, and drive that will be needed in her new role.”
    Provost is an executive-level position, in a tier of leadership that reports directly to Keel. Georgia Southern has five other vice presidents who oversee various aspects of the university, such as finance, information technology and student affairs.
     In addition to the administrative positions she has held at Georgia Southern, Bartels’ service to the university has included being elected as chairwoman of the Council of Deans, chairwoman of the Institutional Strategic Planning Committee, member of the President’s Task Force on Online Programs and member of the President’s Task Force on Program Review. 
     “I am honored to be selected as Georgia Southern University's next provost and vice president for academic affairs,” Bartels said. “I look forward to working with Georgia Southern's extraordinary administrators, faculty and staff as we continue to move the university to its next level of excellence and accomplishment in teaching, scholarship, and service to all of our communities of interest.”
     Bartels has served as president of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, an organization that represents more than 600 schools of nursing across the country. In her scholarly efforts, she has published more than 30 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, co-authored a book and written at least three key white papers on higher education. She has been recognized for several fellowships, including one from the National Institutes of Health. 
    Before joining Georgia Southern, she served as the chairwoman of nursing at Alverno College in Milwaukee from 1990 to 1999 and worked as a staff nurse in the Intensive Care Unit at Columbia Hospital in Milwaukee. She received a Ph.D. in nursing from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, a Master of Science in Nursing from Marquette University, a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Alverno and a diploma in nursing from the Columbia Hospital School of Nursing. She is a past recipient of the Sister Bernadette Armiger Award, the highest honor given by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing.
    Her practice and research experiences have focused on community-based nursing practice and education as well as the health-care needs of individuals dealing with chronic illnesses, including those experiencing acute neurological, cardiovascular and respiratory impairments. She has also conducted research in a variety of nursing practice and higher education areas. Most recently, her scholarship has focused on teaching, learning, critical thinking and outcome assessment in nursing education. Her current research and writing activities focus on the development and measurement of teaching, learning, and assessment outcomes in nursing and higher education. She has served on the educational policies committees, discipline deans committees, curriculum committees, strategic planning councils and research and assessment councils at Alverno and Georgia Southern. She has taught theory and clinical practice in all areas of the nursing curriculum.