MORGANTOWN, W. Va. — The West Virginia University School of Nursing will welcome Dr. Devon Noonan as the keynote speaker for the Kandzari Lectureship, set for Thursday, April 23, 2026.
Noonan, PhD, MPH, FNP-BC, CARN, FIAAN, FAAN, is the Associate Dean for Community Engagement Science and Director of Rural Health Equity and an Associate Professor at Duke School of Nursing. She is a nationally recognized expert in prevention science, community engagement, rural public health and advocacy to improve health and prevent disease in rural communities.
The lectureship, “Rural Health Nursing: Grounded in Community Based Solutions,” will be held at the WVU Health Sciences Center, Okey Patteson Auditorium. A reception will begin at 5:15 p.m. in the lobby outside the auditorium and the lecture will begin at 6 p.m. The event will be livestreamed on the WVU School of Nursing YouTube channel.
Dr. Noonan’s research program uses principles of community engagement to develop and implement health behavior change interventions in rural communities that significantly decrease chronic disease risk, with the majority of these interventions focusing on tobacco cessation. Collectively, she has disseminated this work broadly and has an impressive record of both internal and external research funding, receiving multiple internal grants and external funding as a PI from Sigma Theta Tau, the American Lung Association and the National Institutes of Health.
Dr. Noonan has a longstanding rural academic health department collaboration with Granville Vance Public Health in North Carolina, where she is a researcher in residence. She established the Health Promotion and Wellness Research Incubator at the Duke School of Nursing to serve as a platform to support innovation between academic and community partners. This platform has led to the development of multiple co-created innovations to decrease chronic disease risk and supported the recent funding of a Rural Health Equity Hub/Center at Duke University, supporting interdisciplinary research to address rural chronic disease inequities in North Carolina.
Dr. Noonan also sits on the board of directors of the Green Rural Redevelopment Group a rural micro farming CBO and has worked with this group for over five years to build community capacity to implement chronic disease prevention programs with an emphasis on sustainable and scalable practices that support local economic development and investment.
In addition to the lecture, the WVU School of Nursing will honor outstanding student achievements and present awards. New members will also be inducted into the Alpha Rho Chapter of Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society — an international community of nurses, dedicated to the advancement of knowledge, teaching, learning, and service through the cultivation of communities of practice, education and research.
The Kandzari Memorial Nursing Lectureship was created to honor Judy C. Kandzari, who was a member of the faculty at the WVU School of Nursing from 1967 until her untimely death in 1996. A West Virginian, she earned an EdD in Community Health Education, a master’s degree in Counseling and Rehabilitation, and bachelor’s and master’s degrees in nursing, all from West Virginia University. The Memorial Lectureship is designed to offer insight into nursing in rural settings through presentations by nurse leaders who are experts in rural health.
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CONTACT: Wendy Holdren
Director of Communications and Marketing
WVU School of Nursing
304-581-1772; wendy.holdren@hsc.wvu.edu