Chamberlain Taps Proven Leader to Steer Ambitious Expansion

CHICAGO, IL – September 14, 2026

Chamberlain University, the nation's largest nursing school and a cornerstone of the Covista (NYSE: CVSA) healthcare education portfolio, has announced a significant leadership appointment poised to accelerate its national growth strategy. Jason Dunne, DNP, MBA, MN, RN, will return to the institution as its next Chief Academic Officer, effective today. The move signals a clear intent to not only expand Chamberlain's physical footprint but also to deepen its impact on the U.S. healthcare workforce crisis.

Reporting to Chamberlain President Amelia Manning, Dunne will assume command of the academic strategy for approximately 40,000 students across a network of on-campus and online programs. His appointment comes at a pivotal moment, as the university is publicly committed to an aggressive expansion plan that involves launching 10 to 15 new campuses by fiscal year 2029. This isn't just a personnel change; it's the installation of a leader whose professional history is a blueprint for the very growth Chamberlain is pursuing.

A Strategic Appointment for Aggressive Growth

In the world of higher education, rapid, multi-campus expansion is a complex operational challenge fraught with risks to academic quality and student outcomes. Chamberlain's strategy hinges on executing this growth without compromising its standards. In selecting Jason Dunne, the university has recruited a leader with a directly relevant and proven track record.

Most recently, Dunne served as Chief Academic Officer at Arizona College of Nursing, where he was a key architect of its significant growth. During his tenure, he provided academic leadership through the opening of 14 new campuses in just four years—a feat that required a sophisticated understanding of scaling academic quality, managing faculty development, and navigating accreditation across multiple states. This experience makes him uniquely qualified to pilot Chamberlain's own ambitious rollout, which is already underway with a new Nashville campus accepting applications for January 2027 and its 25th campus having opened in Cincinnati this past August.

Chamberlain President Amelia Manning highlighted the strategic value of Dunne's background. "Jason Dunne brings a combination of bedside experience and academic leadership at the highest level, and that shapes how he approaches nursing education," said Manning. "It gives him a perspective on student success that is not theoretical; it is earned. Chamberlain already sets the standard for nursing education at scale, and I have full confidence Jason is exactly the leader who will help us build on that position."

This expansion is backed by the formidable resources of its parent company, Covista Inc., which bills itself as America's largest healthcare educator. With a strong financial performance that exceeded guidance in fiscal year 2026, Covista is well-positioned to fund the capital-intensive process of campus development, providing the stable foundation necessary for Dunne to execute his academic strategy.

The 'Bedside to Boardroom' Advantage

What makes Dunne a particularly compelling choice is his career trajectory, which spans the full arc of the healthcare profession. He began his career not in an administrative office but as a registered nurse, gaining firsthand clinical experience in demanding environments like critical care, emergency, and medical-surgical nursing. This foundation in direct patient care provides a level of authenticity and practical insight that is often missing from high-level academic administration.

From the bedside, Dunne methodically built a career in educational leadership. His journey included roles as a Director of Nursing and a Dean of Health Sciences before his first tenure at Chamberlain from 2015 to 2020, where he served as a Campus President and later as a Senior Director of Campus Operations. His operational acumen was honed by managing multiple campuses and driving regional performance. His current role as President of the Nursing Consortium of Florida further demonstrates his system-level influence, where he helps guide an organization representing 80 member schools and health systems.

This blend of clinical empathy and operational expertise is the 'earned' perspective Manning referenced. It means he understands the end goal—producing practice-ready, competent, and compassionate nurses—because he has lived it. For a systems-based operation like Chamberlain, which aims to standardize excellence across dozens of locations, having a leader who can translate academic theory into practical, scalable classroom and clinical strategies is a profound competitive advantage.

A Scalable Solution to a National Crisis

Dunne's appointment and Chamberlain's expansion are not happening in a vacuum. They are a direct, market-based response to one of the most pressing challenges facing the country: a chronic and deepening shortage of healthcare professionals. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects hundreds of thousands of openings for registered nurses over the next decade, driven by an aging population and a retiring workforce. Chamberlain's mission is explicitly tied to addressing this gap.

Dunne himself articulated this purpose upon his appointment. "It's an honor to return to Chamberlain, a university with the national footprint and reputation to lead healthcare education forward," he stated. "My focus is clear: build on the academic momentum already underway across our faculty and programs, and keep expanding access so more students, no matter where they start, can pursue or advance a career in healthcare."

This focus on access is reinforced by the university's recognition as an "Opportunity University" by the 2025 Carnegie Student Access and Earnings Classification, a designation reflecting its success in enrolling students from diverse backgrounds and enabling their post-graduation economic mobility. Under the new leadership of President Amelia Manning, who previously helped drive massive enrollment growth and student success initiatives at Southern New Hampshire University, Chamberlain is doubling down on this model. Dunne's role will be to ensure the academic engine can not only handle this scale but thrive on it, maintaining quality while increasing the pipeline of qualified graduates.

The Covista Ecosystem: A Platform for Impact

Understanding Chamberlain's strategy requires looking at its parent company, Covista. The publicly traded company operates a portfolio of five major accredited institutions, including medical and veterinary schools, that collectively serve over 100,000 students. This structure creates a powerful ecosystem for tackling the healthcare workforce shortage from multiple angles. Covista's recent moves to expand and strengthen its corporate leadership bench indicate a coordinated, enterprise-wide push to accelerate this mission.

Within this framework, Chamberlain is the primary engine for nursing and allied health talent. Dunne's success in scaling its academic programs will have a ripple effect across the entire Covista system, reinforcing its value proposition to investors and its social contract with the public. By leveraging a centralized corporate structure for finance and strategy while empowering institutional leaders like Dunne and Manning to drive academic and operational excellence, Covista has built a platform designed for impact at scale.

The appointment of Jason Dunne is therefore more than a leadership shuffle. It is a calculated, strategic move that places an experienced operator at the helm of a critical growth engine, backed by a well-capitalized parent company, at a time of immense national need. As Chamberlain University pushes forward with its expansion, Dunne's ability to replicate his past success in scaling quality academic programs will be a key determinant in the future of healthcare education in America.