Pinnacle Lecture Series

Each semester, the Connell School brings a widely recognized nurse leader to Boston College to speak on an issue at the forefront of health care. Pinnacle lectures are open to all CSON students, staff, faculty, alumni, and preceptors as well as practitioners and scholars unaffiliated with Boston College. View archived videos of past Pinnacle lectures.

SPRING 2023

Reflections and Projections:

My Career at the Vanguard of Public Health and Aging

Wednesday, March 22, 2023, 5 p.m.
Yawkey Center, Murray Room


Jennie Chin Hansen

Jennie Chin Hansen ’70, H’08

M.S., RN, FAAN
Past CEO, American Geriatrics Society
Former President, AARP


Hansen is the spring 2023 Dr. Maureen P. McCausland Pinnacle Keynote Speaker.

This lecture is designated for 1.0 contact hour.

Watch a full recording of the lecture below

About the speaker

One of the “Sages in Aging” designated by the network PBS in 2022, Jennie Chin Hansen is an expert in the areas of dementia, workforce, chronic complex care, geriatric emergency departments and health equity. A past CEO of the American Geriatrics Society, the largest professional membership organization of gero-clinicians committed to the care of older adults living with care complexity, Hansen was also president of the 38 million-member organization AARP during the negotiations and development of the Affordable Care Act.

A stakeholder who crafted the first-ever California Master Plan for Aging and served on the Healthy California for All Commission with a goal to extend health care to all California residents, Hansen also serves in advisory roles with startup entities. 

Over 25 years in San Francisco, Hansen was a leader in growing integrated, community-based services for nursing home-eligible older persons. That groundbreaking, integrated and coordinated service delivery system was the prototype for the 1997 federal law that established the Program of All Inclusive Care to the Elderly (PACE) into the Medicare and Medicaid programs. PACE now operates extensively in California and in 30 other states.

Hansen has received the American Society on Aging’s Hall of Fame Award, the National Council on Aging’s Lifetime Achievement Award, and was named one of the 50 national Influencers in Aging by PBS’ Next Avenue. 

Biography condensed and edited from the American Academy of Nursing

Continuing Education Contact Hours

This nursing continuing professional development activity is designated for contact hours provided by the Boston College Connell School of Nursing Continuing Education Program.

Boston College Connell School of Nursing Continuing Education Program is approved as a provider of nursing continuing professional development by The American Nurses Association Massachusetts, an accredited approver by the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation. 

Past Pinnacle Lecture Speakers


Click on the links below to view past lectures

Jennie Chin Hansen
Past CEO, American Geriatrics Society; Former President, AARP
Spring 2023

Angelleen Peters-Lewis
Chief Operating Officer and Chief Nurse Executive, Barnes-Jewish Hospital
Fall 2022

Rear Admiral Aisha K. Mix
Chief Nurse Officer, U. S. Public Health Service
Spring 2022

Katherine E. Gregory
Dean, Connell School of Nursing, Boston College
Fall 2021

Susan Gennaro
Dean, Connell School of Nursing, Boston College
Spring 2021

Patricia Davidson
Dean, School of Nursing, Johns Hopkins University
Fall 2020

Gennaro Rocco
Director, Steering Committee, Scientific Research Center Centro di Eccellenza per la Cultura e la Ricerca Infermieristica

Alessandro Stievano
Research Fellow in Nursing, Centre of Excellence for Nursing Scholarship OPI, Rome
Fall 2019

Sheila Davis
Chief of Clinical Operations and Chief Nursing Officer, Partners in Health
Spring 2019

Lorna Finnegan
President, National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties
Executive Associate Dean, University of Illinois at Chicago College of Nursing
Fall 2018

Susan Orsega
Chief Nurse Officer, United States Public Health Service
Spring 2018

Marla Weston
Chief Executive Officer, American Nurses Association Enterprise
Fall 2017

Patricia Flatley Brennan
Director, National Library of Medicine
Spring 2017

Loretta Sweet Jemmott
Vice President for Health and Health Equity and
Professor, College of Nursing and Health Professions,
Drexel University
Fall 2016

Kathleen Rice Simpson
Perinatal Clinical Nurse Specialist
Editor in Chief, MCN: The American Journal of Maternal Child Nursing
Spring 2016

Margaret Grey
Annie W. Goodrich Professor, Yale School of Nursing
Fall 2015

Antonia M. Villarruel
Margaret Bond Simon Dean of Nursing, University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing
Spring 2015

Maureen E. Gormley ’85
Chief Operating Officer, National Institutes of Health Clinical Center
Fall 2014

Courtney H. Lyder
Dean and Professor, UCLA School of Nursing
Assistant Director, UCLA Health System
Executive Director, UCLA Health System Patient Safety Institute
Spring 2014

Maureen P. McCausland ’72, M.S. ’77
Senior Vice President and System Chief Nursing Officer, MedStar Health
Fall 2013

Lee Woodruff
Best-selling author, CBS This Morning show contributor
Co-founder, Bob Woodruff Foundation
Spring 2013

Angela Barron McBride
Distinguished Professor and University Dean Emerita, Indiana University School of Nursing
Fall 2012

Karen Daley, M.S. ’04, Ph.D. ’10
President, American Nurses Association
Spring 2012

Karen H. Morin
President of the Honor Society of Nursing, Sigma Theta Tau International
Fall 2011

Linda Burnes Bolton
Vice President and Chief Nursing Officer, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
Spring 2011

Terry Fulmer, M.S. ’77, Ph.D. ’83 
Dean, New York University College of Nursing
Fall 2010

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