was then recruited by McKeesport Hospital as faculty
in their respected diploma School of Nursing. After
receiving her master’s degree under the mentorship
of University of Pittsburgh’s Ruth Kuehn, the founder
and past dean of the School of Nursing, she joined the
School as assistant professor of surgical nursing. In
the following years, she earned the first PhD in higher
education from the School of Education.
Dr. Kelly returned to McKeesport Hospital to serve as
director of nursing. In this position – she was the only
PhD nurse in such a role in a community hospital – she
made advancements for patient care and nursing,
including permitting marriage of students, admitting
the first male students, providing in-service nursing,
hiring one of the early nurse practitioners, encouraging
nurse decision making, and developing a psychiatric
unit and intensive care unit. (These activities were
quite rare in those times!) She began a relationship
with the community college to teach nursing courses
for credit. As a result,