M. Elaine Tagliareni, EdD, RN, CNE, FAAN is currently a Chief Program Officer and Director of the NLN Center for Excellence in Care of Vulnerable Populations at the National League for Nursing, Washington, DC. For over 25 years Dr. Tagliareni was a Professor of Nursing and the Independence Foundation Chair in Community Health Nursing Education at Community College of Philadelphia. She also served as President of the NLN from 2007-2009; in that position she worked to re-frame the dialogue concerning entry into practice to focus on developing and supporting models that increase the academic progression of all nursing graduates, from LPN to baccalaureate to masters’ and doctoral programs, to build a more diverse and educated workforce. In her role as Independence Foundation Chair, she has served as president of the National Nursing Centers Consortium (NNCC) to advance state and federal health policy to include nurse managed health centers as essential safety net providers for older adults and other vulnerable populations.
 
Dr. Tagliareni has a long history of organizational leadership and grant funded initiatives, funded through the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, National Institutes of Health, The John A. Hartford Foundation, Independence Foundation and the Independence Blue Cross Foundation and  to advance nursing practice and education, increase diversity of the nursing workforce and promote educational mobility for all nurses through the creation, implementation, and dissemination of new educational models.  From 2012-2015 she was the PI on a Hearst Foundations funded project to disseminate the NLN Advancing Care Excellence for Seniors (ACE.S) program to faculty nationally. 
 
Dr. Tagliareni received her BSN from Georgetown University School of Nursing, a master’s degree in Mental Health and Community Nursing from the University of California, San Francisco, and her doctorate from Teachers College, Columbia University.