The School of Nursing hit the trifecta this year when three of its faculty and staff were named among Outstanding 25 Texas Nurses for 2026 by the Texas Nurses Association (TNA). Jacki Hecht, Verónica García Walker and Julie Zuñiga received the honor in May, when the TNA selected them from more than 240 submissions.
Jacki Hecht started out as a nutrition science major and worked with children as a nutritionist and then as a nurse before moving into gerontology. She’s now the Project Coordinator of the Johnson-Turpin Center for Gerontological Nursing.
“As a nutritionist working in a Children’s Hospital, I saw that it was the nurses who were the leaders in caring for the children and their families,” said Hecht, MSN, RN. “I got inspired and thought, ‘That’s what I want to do.’”
Hecht’s research and practice focus on motivating health behavior change and improving nursing home experiences.
“Our population is aging,” she said. “How do we help people to live well and thrive as they progress through the aging process?”
Hecht noted that nowadays, aging is often stigmatized, and that our society doesn’t honor the wisdom and experience an older generation might have.
“There’s a lot we can do to help aging people live enriching and meaningful lives,” she said.
Hecht said it was a great honor to be selected by the TNA for the achievement.
“I’ve been a nurse for almost 40 years, and it’s very gratifying and rewarding to be recognized by my peers,” she said. “It validates the work I’ve been doing.”
Dr. Ronnie García Walker said she was very engaged in her research when she learned that she had been selected for the TNA award.
“It’s an honor to be chosen,” said García Walker, PhD, RN, CNE. “You are simply doing the work you love and are grateful that it has been recognized.”
García Walker, who serves as the director of the Center for Professional Development and Scholarship, is completing her first NIH-funded research study, which focuses on the perceptions and experiences of women diagnosed with schizophrenia spectrum disorders who live in long-term care settings.
Specifically, the study examines their perceptions of social connectedness. García Walker said she asks the women to describe their experiences of social connectedness when they were younger and now, while they are in long-term care.
She then asks the women if they have ideas about how they could better connect socially with others while living in a nursing home.
“I want to know what their ideas are. We are working together to co-create important future interventions to combat loneliness and promote social connectedness in women diagnosed with schizophrenia spectrum disorders.”
She has worked with 100 women in 30 nursing homes in Texas.
As a native Texan who started her nursing career in Austin at the county hospital, Dr. Julie Zuñiga found recognition from the Texas Nurses Association especially gratifying.
“It’s a huge honor to be recognized when we have so many amazing nurses in the state,” said Zuñiga, PhD, RN, FAAN.
Zuñiga’s research on chronic disease management, including diabetes, has crossed international borders into Kenya and Mexico. Currently, she’s working with a team on diabetes management in rural Mexico.
“The intervention is working pretty well,” she said. “Community health workers are conducting home visits and providing education. Diabetes is really hard to manage there; they don’t have a lot of access to care, and the community is really motivated to improve and change their health. It’s a pretty exciting project.”
In the U.S., Zuñiga works with technology like Continuous Glucose Monitors (CGM) to obtain data and monitor glucose levels in diabetics. Zuñiga’s father was pre-diabetic for years and recently developed diabetes. He already has neuropathy in his feet.
“I’m not sure if we’re intervening early enough,” she said. “We’re trying to decrease the stress in people’s bodies earlier and younger, and not necessarily with medications. We’re trying to get people to walk, using their large muscles, making some changes in their diets, decreasing carbs, that kind of thing.”
Zuñiga said the three nurses selected by TNA represent the quality of the faculty and professional staff at the School of Nursing.
Related Article: View the related article published on UT News: 3 School of Nursing Faculty Named Among Texas Nurses Association’s 25 Outstanding Texas Nurses of 2026.