Alumni recognized for achievements at 2021 All School Reunion

Kari Miller, Elizabeth Saewyc, and Oriana Beaudet

The School of Nursing Alumni Society named the recipients of its annual awards — Rising Star, Distinguished Alumni Humanitarian and Excellence in Innovation.

Rising Star Award: Kari Miller, DNP ’14
Kari Miller serves as director of Clinical Informatics at Optum, where she manages technical solutions that ease nursing documentation burden, monitor quality of care and allows the company to assess the quality of clinical processes and services provided. She is passionate about making nursing better by understanding the challenges nurses face and improving technology and systems so they align with nursing care processes while also harnessing data that can improve the profession and health. Miller has built award-winning software for nursing documentation that exemplifies her dedication to being part of health care redesign and building tools to improve quality patient care. Furthermore, she shares her passion and knowledge by leading practicum experiences for DNP students.

Distinguished Alumni Humanitarian Award: Elizabeth Saewyc, BSN ’96
Elizabeth Saewyc is a professor and director of the University of British Columbia School of Nursing. Saewyc’s research focuses on how stigma and trauma influence the health of marginalized young people and what protective factors and interventions can foster resilience. Populations include lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and Two Spirit (LGBTQ2S) teens; runaway and homeless youth; sexually abused and sexually-exploited adolescents; and Indigenous young people in Canada and other countries. She heads the Stigma and Resilience Among Vulnerable Youth Centre (SARAVYC) in Vancouver. She is a fellow in the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine (2011), the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences (2013), and the American Academy of Nursing (2016). She also was an inaugural fellow in the Canadian Academy of Nursing.

Excellence in Innovation Award: Oriana Beaudet, DNP ’17
While earning her Doctor of Nursing Practice degree in health innovation and leadership, Oriana Beaudet identified a gap in knowledge and practice about the existing state of nursing innovation. She interviewed nursing leaders across the nation who were engaged in transformative change and that led to her design of systems solutions and cross-sector partnerships to activate nursing innovation in a variety of health care settings. Beaudet created the Planting Seeds of Innovation workshop, which has shaped the innovation and design thinking mindset of hundreds of nurses and health care professionals. Her recent body of work as vice president of Nursing Innovation for ANA Enterprise exemplifies her ability to innovate and scale initiatives for significant change nationally and globally. In response to the COVID pandemic, Beaudet designed the ANA COVID-19 Workplace Survey, which drove the Corona Virus Response Fund for Nurses. She also started the Pulse of the Nation’s Nurses survey series, which gathers national data and works with a national advisory board to build innovation concepts and leadership principles into the upcoming edition of the scope and standards of nursing practice manual.

The awards were presented at the All School Reunion held virtually in April.
If you know an alum who should be considered for one of these awards, contact John S. Kilbride at kilbride@umn.edu.