Posted: Wednesday, February 20, 2019

The University of Evansville’s College of Education and Health Sciences has announced the upcoming investiture of Jerrilee LaMar as the holder of the University’s White Family Endowed Professorship of Nursing. The ceremony is planned for Saturday, March 2, at 1:30 p.m. in Neu Chapel.

The White Family Endowed Professorship in Nursing was established to promote undergraduate teaching excellence in nursing. The professorship is awarded to a faculty member who has demonstrated a commitment to the education of nursing students at UE, as well as to advancing the University of Evansville Department of Nursing and the practice of nursing education.

The professorship was named for Linda E. White, who completed the Deaconess School of Nursing diploma program earning a Bachelor of Science in nursing from UE in 1976. In addition, she earned her Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from Indiana State University. She earned her Master in Business Administration from UE in 1983. White is the current chair of the University of Evansville Board of Trustees. She retired as president and CEO of Deaconess Health System in 2017 and took on the position of director of Deaconess Foundation. She joined Deaconess in 1974 and held numerous positions during her tenure. White’s civic and community involvement includes an extensive list of local organizations. She is a director for Old National Bancorp and has served as a board member of Leadership Evansville, Operation City Beautiful, Ark Crisis Nursery, and Junior League. She is a fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives. In 2001, White was recognized as Evansville’s Athena Award recipient, and in 2004, was named UE’s Delta Sigma Pi Business Leader of the Year. In 2014, she was inducted into the Evansville Business Hall of Fame. She also serves on the Indiana Economic Development Committee.

LaMar joined UE’s faculty in 2007 after leaving Deaconess Hospital. She had worked for more than 17 years at Deaconess, beginning her career there as a staff nurse on the Pediatric Unit. As assistant head nurse of the unit, she found her passion for teaching and developed a cross-training program for nurses between pediatrics and the nurseries. She became manager of the Employee Education and Development Department, and while working full-time, earned her master’s in nursing from UE and her PhD in curriculum and instruction from ISU, Terre Haute. Her doctoral research centered on clinical nursing education.

LaMar helped to develop the nursing intern and extern programs at Deaconess Hospital and eventually left her position as interim vice president and chief nursing officer at Deaconess to teach nursing full-time at the University of Evansville.

LaMar is passionate about access to health care on a global scale and has been active in leading medical mission trips with Deaconess Hospital to impoverished St. Mary’s Parrish in northwest Jamaica for almost 25 years. She continues to take nursing students with her on these mission trips in order to provide them with life-transforming experiences. LaMar has taught nursing at UE’s Harlaxton College and has had the opportunity to spend four fall semesters there, as well as visit between semesters to build relationships with healthcare organizations and British Schools of Nursing and secure clinical sites for UE nursing students.

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