Women’s History Month: Miller serves the community while advancing her career

Editor’s Note: In celebration of Women’s History Month (March 1-March 31), UTHealth Houston is featuring outstanding members of our community.

A registered nurse for 22 years, D’Hania Miller is still striving for personal growth while also helping improve access to nursing education for women; particularly women of color.

Miller has been an employee at UTHealth Houston since 2019 and is currently an undergraduate instructor in the Simulation and Clinical Performance Laboratory at Cizik School of Nursing at UTHealth Houston. She plans to pursue a Doctor of Nursing Practice this fall with the hope of becoming a certified nurse educator and certified simulation educator in the next two years.

While pursuing her own passion, the Houston native who grew up in Third Ward hopes to share inspiration drawn from Mary Eliza Mahoney, the first Black woman to earn a professional nursing license in the United States in 1879.

“I believe Mahoney’s passion to increase nursing education and diversity within the profession lives within me,” Miller said. “My current workforce solution programs were developed on this premise, to increase access to nursing education to underserved and underrepresented populations.

“I’m conscious of the imbalance in women in science, which is even more significant for women of color. Through my nursing journey, I have been influenced by strong female nurses of various nationalities who have played key roles in developing my leadership and clinical studies, invigorating my passion for patient care, and improving access to nursing education for women and women of color.”

Miller has spent much of her professional life participating in, and developing, programs to ignite passion in youth to pursue nursing as a professional career.

The former chair of the Cizik School of Nursing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Council, Miller currently serves as the Outreach, Training, and Education subcommittee chair and the chair-elect of the Faculty Life Council.

Also within the community, Miller is a member of Top Ladies of Distinction, which has a mission of serving youth and adults. She also serves as the recording secretary for the Sickle Cell Anemia Committee, where she works with local and state sickle cell disease patients and their families.

Miller aided Spring Independent School District as an advisory board member from 2015 to 2022, ensuring that career technical education courses were provided throughout the district to offer equal opportunities for learning and certification achievements, as well as evaluating the program needs and its alignment with current industry standards and entry-level employment expectations.

Miller earned a bachelor’s degree in nursing from Prairie View A&M in 2001 before earning her master’s degree in nursing from Texas Woman’s University in 2005.

“I come from a family of nurses who instilled in me the passion of being of service to others in need,” Miller said. “I have always been fascinated with the sciences and enjoyed these classes immensely during my high school, undergrad, and graduate courses.”

Miller credits her family, including her late grandmother, Edith Miller, and mother, Cheryl Price, for helping lay the foundation for her by both pursuing education and helping others. Miller also praises her daughter, Kyani, along with her four bonus children — niece T’Aira and nephews J’Desmond, Quentin, and Darius, whom she has helped raise.