Alison Gates Brown, MPH, BSN, remembers her mother encouraging her and her three sisters to be independent and self-sufficient, and to make a difference in service to others. Her father—a pharmacologist—turned cleaning a fish on the shores of Lake Champlain into anatomy lessons, fostering her love of science. These early influences led her to a nursing education at University of Vermont. From there, she launched a 45-year-plus career at the forefront of health care, including serving as president of the University of Maryland Medical Center (UMMC).

Now, she’s giving back to the alma mater that helped her get her start. Brown and her husband, Ken Kolodner, ScD, have established a scholarship to assist students in the UVM College of Nursing and Health Sciences Direct Entry to Master of Science in Nursing Program. Their support comes at a critical time: To help address nationwide nursing workforce shortages, UVM is finding innovative ways to train tomorrow’s nurses. The program provides a path for talented people with a non-nursing major to pursue a nursing career and removes potential barriers to entry by addressing some of the challenges students face when seeking a master’s degree.

For Brown, who was the keynote speaker for the 2024 Department of Nursing White Coat Ceremony, motivation comes in part from a desire to open opportunities for others to experience UVM as she did. Some of her earliest mentors as a nursing student left a lasting impression. They helped her dream big. “

Janet Ruth Sawyer, PhD, associate professor of nursing, was an inspiration to me,” she said. “In my senior year, she was especially influential, helping me to imagine the possibilities for where a career in health care might take me, building on a foundation of nursing.”

Brown took those possibilities and ran with them. After seven years of clinical practice, she pursued a master’s degree in public health, driven by a desire to improve health for entire communities. Throughout her 31 years in hospital leadership, including six as president of UMMC’s Midtown Campus, her passion for this work never wavered.

At the 2024 White Coat Ceremony, she asked students to consider the spectrum of opportunities that a nursing career offers—while never forgetting that caring for others is at the core of their chosen profession.

“There are so many places where you will find nurses doing interesting things in a variety of roles and organizations,” Brown told the crowd in Ira Allen Chapel. “As you take this big, huge, beautiful step, know that you are also taking on the profound responsibility of people placing their trust in your hands. This is how you will be the nurse, and the leader, the world needs.”