Lynn Clark Callister
2014 Utah and National Mother of Achievement
Lynn Clark Callister was born in Washington DC, the fifth of six children. Her mother Virginia was diagnosed with breast cancer when she was an infant and passed away when Lynn was seven years old. This tender time in her early childhood profoundly influenced the direction of Lynn’s life and her determination to become a mother and a nurse. She received an undergraduate degree summa cum laude in nursing, then married and gave birth to five children. Six additional children were added to her blended family 25 years ago. She received a master’s and doctorate (PhD) in nursing and served as a nurse educator for 25 years following her early years as a clinician. But her greatest love is her own family, which she considers her greatest and most fulfilling achievement. She is married to Reed Richards Callister.
As a young mother, Lynn Callister was on the Kansas Commission on the Status of Women. After her children were grown, she was the Healer’s Art distinguished professor of nursing for 25 years focusing on maternal/newborn health and nursing ethics. During this time she had the privilege of conducting cross-cultural studies of childbearing women, collecting their birth stories around the world. This important work has given voice to mothers globally and have been presented and published widely in professional literature. She was a Fulbright Scholar in St Petersburg Russia teaching maternal/newborn health in nursing graduate programs, as well as a visiting scholar in Amman, Jordan where she taught global health. She has been recognized by the National League of Nursing (NLN) as an outstanding educator and by the Association of Women’s Health, Gynecologic, and Neonatal Nursing (AWHONN) she is a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing and served as co-chair of the AAN expert panel on global health. She is currently on the March of Dimes Nurses Advisory Council and the March of Dimes Bioethics Committee and a global health columnist/editorial board member of MCN: The American Journal of Maternal Child Nursing and on the editorial board of the Journal of Perinatal and Neonatal Nursing.
She advocates for the health of women and children globally, sharing her expertise wherever and whenever possible. She recently returned from providing service for 18 months in Kyiv Ukraine with her husband, which included giving presentations to physicians and nurses on the health of women and children. The Singer Foundation Ukraine Maternal Newborn Education Initiative underwrote this initiative. She was a consultant for the American Mothers Association 2011 United Nations Commission on the Status of Women resolution on violence against pregnant women and will be participating in the American Mothers Association in 2014.