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A clinical associate professor of nursing at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has been selected as a 2025 Fellow of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (FAANP), the only Massachusetts inductee among 51 honorees from 23 U.S. states and two other countries. 

The FAANP program recognizes nurse practitioner (NP) leaders who have made outstanding contributions to NP education, policy, clinical practice and research. Gabrielle Abelard, the newly named Fellow, serves as the graduate program director and psychiatric mental health specialty director for the Elaine Marieb College of Nursing. 

Abelard and the other honorees will be inducted into the FAANP program in June at the 2025 AANP National Conference in San Diego. In addition to her academic activities, Abelard founded and directs a multisite community mental health clinic that provides comprehensive behavioral health services in the home and outpatient settings throughout Massachusetts. She also works as a motivational speaker and enjoys mentoring up-and-coming clinicians in mental health nursing.

In other recent recognitions, Abelard was named Nurse Leader of the Year in Nurse.org’s annual Best of Nursing Awards and given an Excellence in Clinical Practice award by the New England Regional Black Nurses Association.

NP Fellows are chosen both for their “outstanding achievements” and “exemplary service.” That service includes volunteering their expertise as reviewers, topical experts, committee members, journal contributors, mentors and more. “The new Fellows will join an elite and diverse group of NPs who have made — and who continue to make — a positive and profound impact on national and global health,” the association states.

Abelard is past president of the New England chapter of the American Psychiatric Nurses Association. She serves as the first chair of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee of the Massachusetts Association of Advanced Practice Psychiatric Nurses Association.

The AANP represents the interests of the more than 431,000 licensed NPs in the U.S. and provides legislative leadership to advance health policy at the local, state and national levels.