Hello and Happy Spring, Colleagues!
Army-Baylor MHA-MBA Program activity includes the coordination of a number of ACHE Higher Education Network (HEN) events organized by the students and led by CPT John Wolf. The students attended a South Texas ACHE HEN event at the University of the Incarnate Word, provided community support at the San Antonio Food Bank, and attended the annual South Texas ACHE Landscape Conference sponsored by the Army-Baylor University Alumni Network. Additionally, the program was pleased to host MG (RET) David Rubenstein, former ACHE Chairman, and LTC (RET) Jesse Tucker, former Army-Baylor faculty member and Southeast Texas Regent-Elect, as guest speakers during the past few months. COL Noel Cardenas, our Army Regent, will be visiting the program in May. Currently, the Army-Baylor MHA-MBA Class of 54 students is expecting to achieve nearly 100% ACHE membership.
In February, Army-Baylor participated in the University of Alabama in Birmingham (UAB) National Case Study Competition. 36 teams, representing many high-quality, accredited healthcare management programs from across the country, conducted a business case analysis during a two week period beginning at home campuses culminating in rounds of presentations and defense of analyses and recommendations in Birmingham. The subject matter of the case study competition focused on a palliative care/hospice organization based in the Washington, D.C. market.
Our Army-Baylor case study team, coached by LTC Brad Beauvais and LTC Mishaw Cuyler, earned runner-up standing in their competitive bracket and Honorable Mention for the entire competition placing in the Top 12 of all programs.
Army-Baylor Class of 2015 team members:
Ms Jen Holloman, DAC
LCDR James Ketzler, USN
CAPT Marc Orcutt, USAF
Looking forward to the Army-Baylor Class of 2016, we are expecting to have one of the largest cohorts (nearly 60 students) in contemporary program history and the highest number of didactic and resident student populations in more than twenty years. In March, Modern Healthcare ranked Army-Baylor MHA-MBA #5 in the country among CAHME-accredited programs serving 109 full-time graduate students during the 2013-2014 academic year. Clearly, it is important to note that student count is secondarily important to the prime point that the program has a tremendous opportunity to provide even more strategic human capital development to the Military-Federal Health Systems and later to the general market as many of our graduates transition between public and private systems. Army-Baylor exists to instill and enhance healthcare management competencies to more effectively and efficiently utilize resources in the provision of quality healthcare. Even more importantly, Army-Baylor’s mission is to develop competent federal healthcare executives and leaders of healthcare organizations. We appreciate the broad and deep support of our colleagues in helping achieve this mission through doctoral studies for our future faculty, collaborative research, and community referrals of students. Public information about the program is perpetually available at www.baylor.edu\mha.
LTC Forest Kim will be returning to the program in May from a six-month deployment in Afghanistan. LTC Kim served as the Chief of a military medical education and training engagement team helping establish the Afghanistan Armed Forces Academy of Health Sciences. Following a period of well-earned post-deployment decompression and family time, he will assume duties as the 26th Army-Baylor MHA-MBA Program Director during annual the Opening and Closing Ceremony on 20 June. LTC Kim comes to this position with extraordinary development and a positive zeal to make meaningful contributions. His educational background includes UCLA (B.A.), Baylor (MHA), UTSA (MBA), and the University of Washington (Ph.D.). LTC Kim is a board-certified healthcare executive (FACHE) and CAHME Fellow. He has served on the Army-Baylor faculty since 2009 earning numerous programmatic, regional, and national awards and recognition for teaching, service, and research while serving as the Deputy Program Director leading up to his most recent deployment. Please welcome him into his tour as Program Director and support his efforts to serve you and the members of our community.
As I close my final newsletter entry, please let me publically thank the faculty, students, and alumni of this wonderful, venerable graduate program as well as the many dedicated members of our AUPHA family who have readily and frequently provided substantial support. It is been an honor and privilege to serve with each of you. I wish each of you the very best going forward. If I may be of assistance or service to you in the future, or if you want to stay in touch, please do not hesitate to send me a note at professorbewley@gmail.com.
LTC Lee W. Bewley, Ph.D., FACHE
Program Director