09/17/2025

ACHNE Member Spotlight: Jody Spiess PhD, RN, GCPH

Jody Spiess is the current Vice President of ACHNE. She is an Associate Professor at Webster University. She received her ADN from St. Louis Community College at Meramec, her BSN and MSN from Webster University, a graduate certificate in public health from the University of Missouri Columbia, and her PhD in nursing at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. 

Jody found ACHNE in 2016, when she was first offered her position at Webster University. Her mentor and long-time ACHNE member, Mary Ann Drake, asked her to come along to a meeting in June. That meeting was the Annual Institute. Jody had not yet started her teaching position, but Mary Ann promised it would be worth it. At the AI, Jody met people who cared about the things she cared about, people who knew exactly what she was experiencing in her department. She’s been a member ever since.

Jody first joined the education committee, finding it a good opportunity to get great ideas and become a better educator. Eventually, she took on a leadership role as co-Chair of the education committee. For the past two years, she served as Member-at-Large for the Midwest and is the newly elected Vice President.

Jody is passionate about a lot of things, but the top two are disaster preparedness and equity. Disaster preparedness, and educating nurses about disaster preparedness, was the focus of her dissertation and Jody wrote a position paper with Pam Frable on this topic for ACHNE. When she was a new public health nurse, she learned that public health nurses are first responders and realized she did not know what that entailed. She completed the FEMA training in this role. Next, while working at a community college, she assisted in a disaster simulation led by the dean. This led to the realization that nursing students really needed to learn about this while they were in school, an idea that was energized while working with Roberta Lavin at the beginning of Jody’s PhD program. All faculty need to understand the importance of disaster preparedness for all students: when a mass casualty incident happens,  nurses can be drawn from anywhere in the healthcare system to help out and therefore need to know the basics of how disaster response works.

When it comes to equity, Jody is passionate that everyone be treated with respect and empathy, regardless of lifestyle choices, social class, or zip code. She has found a community in ACHNE who cares about these ideals as well.

Jody is proud of her time as a  home visiting nurse in the Nurse Family Partnership program. This was a turning point in her nursing career, as she learned about evidence-based practice and about meeting clients where they were in the moment–teaching what clients wanted to know about instead of a predetermined topic list. As a young mother herself, Jody could share some of her experience with NFP moms. She learned from the moms as well, and carries pieces of them with her still today. Working in the program taught her about how similar people really are and how happy people can be in the poorest of settings, as well as that the moms were not at all what the general public would expect. They were strong and determined to become amazing moms.

On a personal level, Jody is proud of her family, in particular her daughter, a criminal defense attorney. Having become a mother at a young age, Jody was not sure if she and her daughter would have a good life. Today, they are both doing well and helping vulnerable populations.

Jody would like ACHNE members to know how important it is to attend the AI. It’s what “sealed the deal” for her–knowing that other nurses out there cared so much about community health, that nursing doesn’t start at hospital admission and end at discharge. Having the opportunity to be around people who understand you and can acknowledge you is energizing and keeps you going throughout the year. She also encourages members to join a committee, because you really get to know people and form strong friendships