Dr. Marilyn S. Harrington, Ph.D. – 1/10/09
Dean, School of Health Sciences, UTHSCSA
Marilyn S. Harrington is the Dean, School of Health Professions at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. Dr. Harrington’s clinical background is dental hygiene and her Ph.D. is in Higher Education Administration from the University of Missouri at Kansas City. She has spent the last thirty years in dental, dental hygiene, nursing and allied health education. She has published in professional journals on such topics as problem-based learning, dento-facial trauma, injury surveillance, workforce shortages, allied health leadership and research productivity. She has been invited or selected to give over 80 presentations nationwide and published seventeen articles.
Over her career, Dr. Harrington has been awarded over $23 million in grant funds. She was one member of a team that wrote and received a $17 million Department of Defense research grant on the outcomes of disease management of congestive heart failure patients. In 2003, Dr. Harrington was awarded the largest Health Services and Resources Administration (HRSA) grant for curriculum development in Bioterrorism and Public Health Emergencies. The $1.1 million project was for two years. She also received grant funding to establish a Deaf Education and Hearing Science Program in partnership with Sunshine Cottage School for Deaf Children in San Antonio.
Dr. Harrington is responsible for nine different professional programs/departments in the School of Health Professions with campuses in San Antonio and Laredo, Texas. Border health issues, access to health care, health professions education, diversity in health professions, health surveillance and specialized accreditation are key interest areas. She just completed a term on the Board of Directors of the Association of Schools of Allied Health Professions and Planned Parenthood of San Antonio and South Central Texas. She is a Commissioner for the Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs and a consultant to the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. In 2008, she was appointed to the Board of Directors of Morningside Ministries.
Dr. Harrington was the first Dean of the School of Health Professions to create and implement a faculty practice for allied health faculty members. The School established a Comprehensive Outpatient Rehabilitation Facility (CORF) and a Low Vision Center in partnership with the Department of Ophthalmology in the School of Medicine.
Dr. Harrington has participated in state-wide and county-wide health care reform efforts in Utah. She was one of twenty people on the “Health Care Commission” appointed by Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff and San Antonio Mayor Ed Garza. One outcome of the Commission’s work was raising funds to increase the number of students and faculty members for nursing and allied health education programs. However, the workforce crisis in nursing and allied health professions continues.
Dr. Harrington served as Professor and Dean of the College of Health Professions at Weber State University in Ogden, Utah from 1993-97 and as a faculty member, Chair, and Associate Dean at the School of Dentistry at the University of Missouri-Kansas City from 1973 to 1993. In 1973, she served as Chair, of the Department of Dental Hygiene as Wichita State University in Wichita, Kansas.
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