Nursing Prof Selected as 1 of 5 National Macy Faculty Scholars

Associate Nursing Professor Dr. Jessica Devido is one of just five educators from across the nation—and Duquesne’s first nursing faculty member—to be selected as a prestigious Macy Faculty Scholar.

Designed to identify and nurture the careers of promising mid-career educational innovators in medicine and nursing, the two-year Macy Faculty Scholars program aims to develop the next generation of national leaders in these fields.

Devido and her fellow Macy Faculty Scholars cohort members were chosen from a national applicant pool of 82 medical and nursing educators. They were selected because of their accomplishments and future promise as educational leaders and innovators.

“We are thrilled to welcome Dr. Jessica Devido to our newest class of Macy Faculty Scholars,” said Dr. Holly J. Humphrey, president of the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation. “Her work in helping undergraduate pre-licensure nursing students promote maternal-child health equity is critical to preparing the future health care workforce to understand and address systemic inequities.”

Macy Faculty Scholars receive salary support up to $100,000 per year over two years to implement an educational change project in their institution and to participate in a program of career development activities. In addition, the scholars receive mentoring and career advice from the Foundation’s National Advisory Committee.

“The faculty and I are extremely proud of Dr. Devido, who joins a select group of innovators and leaders in medicine and nursing,” said Nursing Dean Dr. Mary Ellen Glasgow. “I know she will benefit from superb networking opportunities and training that the Josiah Macy Scholars Program will provide.”

Devido, who spent months planning her project as part of the Macy Faculty Scholars application process, said being among such a small number educators selected has left her feeling truly humbled.

“I feel so honored and blessed to be able to have this opportunity,” Devido said. “I feel blessed to be at a University with a true mission to serve others, and I have felt that in every capacity here. Our University and our faculty and staff—we serve not only God, but we serve our students, we serve the community and we serve each other.”

Devido, who first joined the School of Nursing faculty in 2014, has been greatly impacted and motivated by her experience as a bedside labor-and-delivery nurse.

“I’ve had the privilege of assisting many women through the birth process. Many of those deliveries were beautiful moments, ones that were filled with hope and joy,” Devido said. “But it’s the ones that left moms and infants on the brink of dying that really stick with me most vividly. All too often, those deliveries were to women of color, and these experiences were traumatic for them and for their support individuals as well for me, their nurse. I really think it was these experiences that first cultivated a passion in me to do better for women.”

These experiences drove Devido to further her education, prompting her to become a pediatric nurse practitioner, which led to her pursuit to become a Ph.D.-prepared nurse scholar. Recognizing that equity and opportunity begin at home, she also earned a certificate in minority health and disparities.

Scholar applicants were asked to share details of a new educational innovation project that they were proposing to develop and implement at their institution. Devido’s project, a Maternal Child Health Equity Fellowship for prelicensure nursing students, will be launched in the School of Nursing.

“With this fellowship, we really want to be innovative and teach our nursing students how to build authentic relationships with the community, to learn from its leaders and all stakeholders how to work for safe motherhood and collective change,” Devido explained. “We want our students to develop critical understanding of the maternal-child health inequities, learn how to listen to mothers of color in new and different ways, as they are the first point of contact. Our nursing students bring passion to their studies. They are important change agents for the future.”

A committed professional and teacher-scholar, Devido’s curiosity and drive foster her research and creativity, and have made her classroom a valuable learning environment for her students.

“I love being a nurse. I love the positive impact that nurses have on the lives of others, and that extends to my students,” Devido said. “And I am committed to immersing my students in the imperative nature of working alongside communities and training them to be impassioned to deliver viable clinical solutions that are going to get at serving vulnerable populations and—in this case—solutions specifically for maternal child health equity.”

She has taught in both the undergraduate and master’s programs in the nursing school, but Devido has consistently taught maternal child health theory and clinical education. She describes it as “her passion and her focus” during her time teaching at Duquesne.

“I’m very excited for the possibilities of how we might be able to impact some of the disparities that are occurring related to maternal child health here in the Pittsburgh area, hopefully changing the experience and the viewpoints of our students to better serve their patients,” said Devido.