Tanya M. Sudia, Ph.D., Selected as Dean of the Louise Herrington School of Nursing

Dear Faculty and Staff:

I am pleased to announce that Tanya M. Sudia, Ph.D., R.N., FNAP, FAAN, has been selected as Dean of Baylor University’s Louise Herrington School of Nursing, effective June 1. Dr. Sudia will succeed Linda Plank, Ph.D. R.N., NEA-BC, who will retire this summer.

Dr. Sudia is very familiar with Baylor and the LHSON, where she served from 2014-19 as the School’s inaugural Associate Dean for Research and Scholarship and a tenured Professor of Nursing, and I am delighted to welcome her back to Baylor. Dr. Sudia brings experience as a nursing dean at two institutions, one of which is in Texas, and she believes in the distinctiveness Baylor provides for nurses. Committed to our mission as a Christian R1 university, she will be a great partner to campus leaders and to healthcare providers in Dallas and throughout the state and region.

As we welcome Dr. Sudia’s return to the University, I am grateful to Dean Plank for her leadership of the LHSON during the past five years. In addition to supporting the growth of our undergraduate nursing major, the development of the innovative Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) hybrid program has reached healthcare systems nationwide, providing them with nurses expertly and compassionately prepared to address patients’ physical, spiritual and social needs. 

I also express my sincere appreciation to the 10-member Dean search committee for their valuable time and service during this nationwide search: Dr. J. Wesley (Wes) Null (chair), Ms. Jerchel Anderson, Dr. Karen Foli, Dr. Brandi Garrett, Dr. Karenna Malavanti, Dr. Roland Paquette, Dr. Deborah Shirey, Dr. Patricia DeFrehn, Dr. Sheron Wagner and Dr. Laura Zebreski.

A highly accomplished nursing leader, Dr. Sudia is currently Interim Dean, Chief Nursing Officer and professor at the University of Texas at Arlington College of Nursing and Health Innovation. Before joining UTA in 2024, she served four years as Dean of Augusta University College of Nursing, the state of Georgia’s largest public university nursing program. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing and a Fellow of the National Academies of Practice.

Dr. Sudia earned her B.S.N. from the University of Akron, and her M.N. and Ph.D. from Emory University. She was a practicing neonatal ICU nurse and transport team member, later becoming a Clinical Nurse Specialist and Neonatal Educator at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta. She joined the faculty at Emory, serving in various capacities, including Faculty Fellow in the Center for Ethics and senior director of the IRB Office. Following a long trajectory at Emory, she joined Mercer University’s Georgia Baptist College of Nursing to co-develop a Ph.D. in Nursing program.

In 2014, Dr. Sudia began her impactful, six-year tenure as Associate Dean at the LHSON where she developed and implemented policies and processes that promoted and enhanced research, including mentoring. She left Baylor to become Dean at Augusta University in 2020, and there she led efforts to increase enrollment across undergraduate and graduate nursing programs, complete two 10-year reaccreditation processes, secure major gifts and establish international partnerships.

As Interim Nursing Dean at UTA, Dr. Sudia has spent the last year leading the largest not-for-profit college of nursing in the U.S. with 17,000 students across three academic departments (undergraduate nursing, graduate nursing, and kinesiology) and three research centers (Bone-Muscle Collaborative Research Center, Center for Healthy Living and Longevity, and Center for Rural Health and Nursing). Additionally, UTA CONHI faculty lead two university centers (Clinical Imaging and Center for Innovation in Health Informatics).

Her tenure at UTA has included increasing enrollment by nearly 9%, developing two new academic programs, directing a $5.1 million Nursing Shortage Reduction Program funded by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board and incorporating training on the use of Electronic Health Records to facilitate nursing students’ transition to nursing practice. Before becoming Interim Dean at UTA, Dr. Sudia was Senior Associate Dean, providing leadership for Undergraduate Nursing, Graduate Nursing, Office of Enrollment and Student Success, and Smart Hospital.

During her career, Dr. Sudia has received more than $10 million in research grants, including securing the LHSON’s initial affiliation with the U.S. Army Graduate Program in Anesthesia Nursing (USAGPAN) and a grant that led to the establishment of the pediatric palliative care collaborative nursing educational initiative in Bengaluru, India. She has advised students on dozens of dissertations, theses, M.S.N. capstone projects and DNP scholarship projects and has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals, contributed to book chapters and other publications and presented at academic conferences and meetings across the country. She also serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Perinatal and Neonatal Nursing.

Please join me in congratulating Dr. Sudia on her appointment – and return to Baylor University – as Dean of the Louise Herrington School of Nursing.

 Sincerely,

Nancy Brickhouse, Ph.D. 
Provost