About the Author

Sheila Grossman, PhD, FNP-BC, APRN, is a Professor of Nursing and Coordinator of the Family Nurse Practitioner Track at Fairfield University School of Nursing. She received a BS in nursing from the University of Connecticut, her MS as a Respiratory Clinical Nurse Specialist from the University of Massachusetts/Amherst, a post-masters degree as a Family Nurse Practitioner from Fairfield University, and her PhD from the University of Connecticut. She has worked many years as a clinician on a variety of medical, surgical, and critical care units and presently practices as a Family Nurse Practitioner in a primary care clinic. She is the coauthor of The New Leadership Challenge: Creating A Preferred Future for Nursing, which is in its third edition (2009) and received an AJN book of the Year Award and has also received an AJN Book of the Year Award for Mentoring in Nursing: A Dynamic and Collaborative Process (2007), and coauthored Gerontological Nurse Certification Review in 2008 with Dr. Meredith Wallace Kazer. She is the author of multiple chapters and journal articles on leadership, mentoring, gerontology, adult health, and palliative care. Her research interests focus on symptom management in palliative care, leadership, pedagogy, cultural competence, and adult patient outcome studies. She is active in Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society, American Association of Critical Care Nurses, National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculty, American College of Nurse Practitioners, and is a certified End of Life Nursing Education Consortium Educator and a Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education Accreditation Site Visitor. She is the winner of the 2009 Josephine Dolan Award for Outstanding Contributions to Nursing Education sponsored by the CT Nurses Association.