Dr. Randolph Rasch

Dr. Randolph Rasch is Professor in the College of Nursing at Michigan State University. With over 30 years of coaching/mentoring experience, he was recently certified as an Executive/Life Coach by the Hudson Coaching Institute. Previously serving as the 9th dean of the Michigan State University College of Nursing he has over 30 years of, primarily, academic leadership experience, including service on professional, corporate and community boards. Among others, he currently serves on the Dean’s Advisory Board, Vanderbilt University School of Nursing (VUSN), and a VUSN representative on the Vanderbilt University Chancellors’ Cabinet Dare-to-Grow Campaign.

Dr. Rasch was the first State-wide Director of Nursing Services/Programs Director in the Tennessee Department of Correction (TDOC), where he provided leadership and direction for nursing services and assisted the Director of Health Services with the overall development, management, and operation of Health Services in the TDOC. As part of a three-member management team, Dr. Rasch was responsible for designing and implementing a system of health care for the TDOC and as Programs Director, leading the development and facilitating the implementation of the Quality Assurance Program for Health Services in the TDOC.

He previously served as a member-at-large to the Board of Directors of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) and served on the AACN/American Organization of Nurse Leaders (AONL)Advisory Task Force to implement recommendations of Advancing Healthcare Transformation: A New Era for Academic Nursing. He is the immediate past chair of the Nursing Deans Group of the Big Ten Academic Alliance. Among governor appointed service, he most recently served, by appointment of the Governor of the State of Michigan, to co-leading the effort to reduce maternal-child morbidity and mortality in the State of Michigan and chaired the Primary Care Connections Governor’s Task Force of the Coronavirus – Racial Disparities Task Force and also the Michigan Implicit Bias LARA Advisory Task Force.

Dr. Rasch has consulted on a multitude of projects including analysis of nursing productivity and workload, and process improvement and improvement of organizational performance in healthcare delivery. Notably, his expertise is in the area of primary care and community health, particularly the roles, functions and appropriate skill mix for all levels of nursing, licensed practical nurses, registered nurses, advanced practice nurses/nurse practitioners and cultural diversity in healthcare services. Dr. Rasch’s clinical experiences as a registered nurse include charge nurse on a surgical unit in a community hospital and public health nurse (PHN) and PHN Team Leader and home health nurse in a county health department. As a FNP, he has provided care in a prison system; a corporate health care center; and a nurse managed clinic recognized as a clinical agency by the NC Board of Nursing.

A Fellow in the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (FAANP) and a Distinguished Scholar, and Fellow, in the National Academies of Practice (FNAP) and Fellow in the American Academy of Nursing (FAAN), Dr. Rasch holds the distinction of being the first African American male graduate of the nursing program at Andrews University and the first African American male masters prepared FNP (a graduate of the FNP program at Vanderbilt School of Nursing). He is the first African American male to hold the PhD in nursing and was the first African American male public health nurse in the State of Michigan. Other honors include Distinguished Alumni of the School of Nursing, The University of Texas at Austin; The Trailblazer Award of the National Black Nurses Association; The Lulu Wolf Hassenplug Award for Distinguished Career in Nursing, Vanderbilt University School of Nursing; and The Dr. Gene Tranbarger Writing Award, the American Association for Men in Nursing.