Adding Expertise
New Professors Join the College of Nursing
The faculty in The University of New Mexico College of Nursing play multiple roles as teachers, mentors, practitioners and researchers. Three outstanding new professors bring added depth and breadth to the College, expanding its capacity to improve the health of New Mexicans and beyond.
Lisa Day
Professor Lisa Day, PhD, RN, has dedicated her career to teaching and learning for entry-level RN practice. “Introducing new nurses to the practice has been my main focus since making the shift from clinical practice to faculty,” Day says. Her scholarship includes a focus on interprofessional education, and she co-authored a landmark book, “Educating Nurses: A Call for Radical Transformation.” She was named a Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation Faculty Scholar in 2013 and has consulted on several national nursing education projects, including the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching’s National Study of Nursing Education. Day graduated from Long Beach City College in California with an associate’s degree in nursing and then earned her bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees in nursing from the University of California, San Francisco, School of Nursing. “The UNM College of Nursing has such an amazing faculty,” Days says. “I am looking forward to connecting and collaborating.”
Roberta Lavin
Professor Roberta P. Lavin, PhD, FNP-BC, spent 20 years as U.S. Public Health Service officer. She coordinated mass migrations in Guatemala and managed health care in an immigration detention center in Batavia, N.Y., before becoming the chief of Field Operations for the Division of Immigration Health Services. She also worked for the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Tucson, Ariz., and spent a few months “tooling around” the South Pacific on a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration research vessel. In the wake of the 9/11 and the anthrax attacks she was selected to be the director of the secretary’s Command Center for the Department of Health and Human Services and later became the chief of staff for the assistant secretary for Preparedness and Response. Lavin ended her Public Health Service career working once more with the poor and underserved, leading research and development for a national disaster case management program. Her current research focuses on bringing cultural competency around urban and rural communities to practicing nurses and disaster preparedness.
Xiaozhong Yu
Professor Xiaozhong Yu, MD, PhD, MPH, has a multidisciplinary academic background in public health and toxicology, specifically in environmental and occupational health sciences. His research focuses on developing advanced biomedical technologies, such as advanced omics, tissue culture engineering, exposure assessment and systems biology to explore the relationship between environmental exposures and human health. He is also an active member of many professional societies, including the Society of Toxicology, the American Association of Chinese Toxicologists, the Teratology Society and the American Industrial Hygiene Association. He served as a council member of the Safety and Occupational Health Study Section of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As a known expert in reproductive and developmental toxicology, he was invited to serve as an external expert reviewer for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. “I am very impressed by the quality education at the College, and am excited to bring my experience in public health into nursing education, research and service,” Yu says.