Connie Mitchell, MS, APRN, BC

Connie Mitchell joined IHS, Oahu’s largest emergency homeless shelter, as Executive Director in June 2006. Born and raised in Hawaii, she attended the UH at Manoa where she earned both a BS in Nursing and her MSN in Mental Health Nursing.  She is currently pursuing a Doctorate in Nursing Practice through Case Western Reserve University.

Connie brings to IHS a unique combination of skills derived from a long and diverse career that includes nursing, pastoral work and serving in a variety of management capacities at Hawaii State Hospital. Connie broadened her leadership skills when she established the State’s first nurse-run rural mental health clinic in Kau on the Big Island through an innovative Department of Health and University of Hawaii collaboration.

Connie has shared her clinical expertise in Psychiatric Mental Health Nursing through numerous presentations and continues as adjunct clinical faculty at the UH School of Nursing. In 2003, she received the Sustained Superior Performance Award as a State manager and was recognized by the Honorable Judge David Ezra for her significant contribution in resolving the U.S. Department of Justice’s 14-year-old litigation against the Hawaii State Hospital in 2004.

Through her creative leadership style and key role at IHS, Connie strives to build on an organizational culture that affirms staff strengths and through effective programming works to end homelessness on Oahu.