Ann Hoyt Brennan, MSN, RN

Program Leadership and Initiatives Ms. Brennan relocated to Philadelphia, and after several years of clinical work as well as teaching, she received certification in simulation from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). In 2012, she became a simulation specialist at Penn Nursing and has been working with both faculty and students ever since. In her current role as simulation education specialist, she works on simulation curriculum development as well as integrating simulation into undergraduate course content. In addition to simulation curricular development and oversight, she is responsible for the recruitment, hiring, and training of over fifty simulation faculty per year. The simulation program continues to grow with Ms. Brennan’s innovative approach. Among other initiatives, she has introduced experienced practicing professional (content experts) to the simulation environment which serves to increase realism and create partnerships with practicing nursing professionals in the community. And most recently, Ms. Brennan has collaborated with faculty from both Penn GSE and Sp2 on an accepted grant application for the Penn Futures Project. Their goal is to collaboratively offer an interdisciplinary simulated experience to educate students in the schools of Graduate Education, Nursing, and Social Work on the mental and medical health needs of LGBTQ youth.

Ms. Brennan has an active record of service in the community related to nursing education and simulation. Since 2014, she has served as Chair for the Academic Educators subcommittee for the Philadelphia Area Simulation Consortium, and has been a current member of the planning committee for Jefferson, CHOP, Penn Nursing, and Penn Medicine Simulation Facilitators course since 2012. At Penn Nursing specifically, she is a current member of the undergraduate course director’s committee, undergraduate curriculum committee, graduate and undergraduate simulation task force, and now serves as the chair of the LGBTQ curricular subcommittee. She is recognized by her colleagues for her expertise in simulation as a teaching and evaluation methodology, and has guest lectured in the Transformational Nursing Education Program. With a demonstrated love of teaching, Ms. Brennan has offered career counseling for many students, serves as a formal academic advisor to six undergraduates on an annual basis, and is a mentor for Nursing Education master’s students that are studying innovative teaching strategies for educating healthcare providers.

Advisory Consultant, Penn State Hershey Clinical Simulation Center conducted at Columbia University, School of Nursing, Simulation Center Presenter, The Use of Simulation to Deliver Standardized LGBTQ Content: A Case Study in Undergraduate Nursing Education Attendee, The Institute for Medical Simulation Comprehensive Workshop, Harvard University Consultant, Penn Medicine, Hypothermia and Resuscitation Training Institute at Penn