President
President and John Hilton Knowles Professor
Janis P. Bellack, PhD, RN, FAAN, began her tenure as president of the MGH Institute of Health Professions in September 2007 and was officially installed as president on May 3, 2008.
Dr. Bellack, previously Vice President for Academic Affairs/Provost and Professor of Nursing and Health Sciences at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, is a widely published and nationally recognized health professions leader with extensive experience as a federally-funded investigator. As President of the MGH Institute, Bellack also holds an academic appointment as John Hilton Knowles Professor.
While her early career focused on nursing education, Dr. Bellack has been responsible for leading and shaping health professions education across a range of disciplines for more than a decade. Since 1997 she has been a member of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Executive Nurse Fellows Program based at the University of California, San Francisco, Center for the Health Professions. She has been a Senior Fellow at the Center since 1996.
Dr. Bellack is a Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing and was a member of the national advisory committee of the Robert Wood Johnson-funded Partnerships for Quality Education Program from 1999 – 2006. During her thirteen year tenure at the Medical University of South Carolina, she was an effective advocate of interdisciplinary education, and promoted interdisciplinary primary care education as a consultant to the South Carolina Area Health Education Center. She has been associate editor of the Journal of Nursing Education since 1998.
Dr. Bellack earned her PhD in Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation from the University of Kentucky, a master’s degree in pediatric nursing from the University of Florida. She began her nursing education at the University of Virginia, graduating from the school’s last diploma class, followed by a BSN two years later. The UVA nursing alumni association named her the recipient of its 2007 Distinguished Alumna Award. The University of Kentucky named Bellack to its Alumni Hall of Fame in 2002.