2026 DFW Healthcare Student Summit – ACHE of North Texas

The DFW Healthcare Student Summit is designed for early career professionals and healthcare administration students seeking to learn from and connect with experienced industry leaders. Through two engaging panel discussions, attendees will gain practical insights into executive decision making, operational leadership, and the growing role of AI in healthcare.

Agenda:

• 8:30am – 8:50am Coffee, Check-in, and Registration
• 8:50am – 9:00am Welcome and Introductions
• 9:00am – 10:00am Keynote Presentation
• 10:00am – 10:10am Break
• 10:10am – 11:30am Panel Discussion 1 - Executive Strategies for Driving Value & Better Outcomes
• 11:30am – 12:30pm Lunch and Networking (lunch provided)
• 12:30pm – 1:50pm Panel Discussion 2 - The Growth of AI in Healthcare
• 1:50pm – 2:30pm Optional Networking After/Event Ends

Your ticket includes attendance at the Student Summit, a light breakfast with coffee and water, and lunch will be provided at the event as well.

Speakers At A Glance:

Aaron Bujnowski, DSc, FACHE

Managing Director

Alvarez & Marsal

Chad Collins, FACHE

Vice President Operations

Texas Health Resources

Felixia Colón, FACHE

Senior Vice President in Business Development

SCP Health

Emily Flahaven

Director of Nursing Informatics

UT Southwestern Medical Center

Dr. Richard G. Greenhill

Principal and Founder

SmartSigma AI

Nick Kagal, FACHE

Customer Success Executive

Press Ganey

Christina Mathis

Chief Executive Officer

Medical City Las Colinas

Kris Sanders, FACHE

Senior Vice President, Northern Market Growth & Development

Children’s Health Plano

Bert Witherspoon, FACHE

Founder & Managing Partner

Triaxiom Advisors, LLC

Speakers' Bios:

Aaron Bujnowski, DSc, FACHE, is a Managing Director at Alvarez & Marsal, a leading global professional services firm specializing in advisory, consulting, and turnaround management. With two decades of dedicated experience in the healthcare industry, Dr. Bujnowski has built a reputation as a transformative healthcare strategist, empowering health systems and their leaders to attain sustainable competitive advantage.

Dr. Bujnowski served as the former System Chief Strategy Officer of Texas Health Resources, a ~$5 billion integrated health system in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, where he dedicated nearly nine years to developing and executing enterprise-wide strategies.

Dr. Bujnowski holds a Doctor of Science degree in Healthcare Leadership from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He also holds a master’s degree in business administration with the highest honors from The University of Texas at Austin and a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in chemical engineering with a biomedical emphasis from Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah.

Dr. Bujnowski was honored as a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives (FACHE) in 2015. He is a Past President of its North Texas Chapter, where he leads a diverse community of nearly 2,000 healthcare executives and managers.

Felixia Colón, FACHE, serves as Senior Vice President in Business Development at SCP Health, where she leads strategic market development at the executive and health system level. With more than 25 years of healthcare leadership experience, she brings deep expertise in clinical operations, physician practice management, and enterprise growth strategy.

Ms. Colón previously led SCP Health’s Telemedicine and Virtual Care service lines, overseeing expansion across Hospital Medicine, Emergency Medicine, and Critical Care Medicine. Under her leadership, the platform grew from three hospital medicine programs in 2016 to more than 100 sites by 2025, supporting hospitals nationwide with sustainable, high-quality clinical solutions.

Her professional background includes senior leadership roles across multi-specialty, multi-site physician practices, including emergency medicine, academic and private hospital medicine, transitional care medicine, tele-nocturnist and eHealth programs, and post-acute care environments (SNFs and LTACs). She has also led physician outreach initiatives in collaboration with a national health insurance carrier. Prior to joining SCP Health, Ms. Colón served as Senior Vice President for one of the largest independent physician practices in Texas, where she held enterprise-wide responsibility for operations, contracting, business development, marketing, recruiting, and healthcare payment reform initiatives, including participation in CMS’s Bundled Payments for Care Improvement (BPCI) program.

A native of Jacksonville, Florida, Ms. Colón holds a Master of Business Administration with a concentration in Management from Nova Southeastern University and a Bachelor of Health Administration from the University of North Florida. She is a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives (FACHE) and an active leader within the organization, having served as Regent-at-Large for District IV and former President of the ACHE North Texas Chapter. She has also held multiple elected board and committee leadership roles and serves as faculty for SCP Health’s Medical Leadership Intensive, focused on developing physician and advanced practice leaders.

Dr. Richard G. Greenhill has spent over 30 years solving the problems that keep healthcare executives awake at night such as declining quality metrics, patient safety challenges and the persistent gap between healthcare's promise and its operational reality. As principal and founder of SmartSigma AI, he brings rigorous quality science and pragmatic AI implementation expertise to healthcare organizations navigating the intersection of regulatory pressure and technological disruption, turning strategy into sustainable results rather than failed pilots. Elected by his international peers to the prestigious International Academy for Quality and Safety (IAQS), one of the highest lifetime honors in global healthcare quality, Dr. Greenhill serves as editor-in-chief of the International Journal for Quality in Healthcare, Communications (Oxford University Press) and as national faculty for the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE). As a sought-after international speaker on AI in healthcare delivery and a subject matter expert for the World Health Organization and International Society for Quality in Healthcare (ISQua), his voice shapes global healthcare policy while his focus remains on what works in real healthcare organizations. He is a honorably retired U.S. Navy veteran with extensive publications in peer reviewed journals and textbooks. Dr. Greenhill brings academic rigor and operational excellence to every engagement, delivering the strategic clarity and practical implementation support that transforms healthcare organizations.

Nick Kagal, FACHE, brings nearly three decades of healthcare leadership experience, having served in key roles across North Texas health systems including Parkland Health, HealthSouth, and Medical Center of Plano. He is currently a Customer Success executive at Press Ganey and previously held positions such as VP of Marketing and Business Development at SpinSci Technologies and Senior Director of Customer Success for Premier Inc.’s Western U.S. region.

He holds a BA in Biology and Psychology from Austin College and an MBA from Texas A&M University. Nick is a Fellow of both ACHE and HIMSS and serves on the boards of ACHE of North Texas and DFW HIMSS. He is also Co-Chair of the Texas Regional HIMSS Conference and contributes to the HIMSS Governance and Operations Chapter Task Force. Outside of healthcare, Nick is deeply involved in the local arts community, having served on the Plano Cultural Arts Commission and currently on the McKinney Arts Commission. A McKinney resident, he’s an avid sports fan, long-distance cyclist, weekend warrior athlete, and musician who plays guitar and bass in local cover bands Sonic Dissonance and The Grohl Models.

Christina Mathis has served as CEO at Medical City Las Colinas since March 2025. She provides leadership, strategic direction and direct administrative responsibility for all aspects of financial operations, clinical quality outcomes and patient experience for the 99-bed acute care hospital with more than 500 employees. The hospital offers comprehensive services, including Level III trauma services, cardiovascular, orthopedic and spine surgery, robotic surgery, women’s services and a neonatal ICU (NICU). She proudly serves on the Board of Directors for ACHE North Texas, Irving Schools Foundation, Irving-Las Colinas Chamber of Commerce and Trinity University Healthcare Administration Alumni Board.

Kris Sanders, FACHE, currently serves as Senior Vice President, Northern Market Growth and Development at Children’s Health Plano. She is board certified in Healthcare Administration. She has a Bachelor of Healthcare Administration as well as her Master of Business Administration. Kris currently oversees the leadership and implementation of all Northern Market activity in DFW for Children’s Health. She previously worked at Envision Physician Services, which she worked as Vice President of Operations. Other previous roles include opportunities at Methodist Health System and The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

Kris is a board-certified Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives (FACHE). She also serves as a board member and President for ACHE North Texas. She is a proud member of National Association of Health Services Executives (NAHSE) where she also serves as the President for the DFW chapter. Other board of director affiliations include Live Oak Surgery Center and Children’s Advocacy Center of Collin County. She is a proud Leadership Plano Class 39 graduate and was awarded Diversity Leaders “Rising Star” by Modern Healthcare magazine in 2024. In addition to the professional work, Kris is a proud member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated Chi Zeta Omega chapter in Plano, TX.

Bert Witherspoon, FACHE, is a board-certified healthcare executive and the Founder & Managing Partner of Triaxiom Advisors, LLC, a boutique, bespoke advisory firm built on one conviction: healthcare works best when it stays deeply personal. Through Triaxiom Advisors, he helps provider-owned practices, surgical groups, and healthcare ventures reclaim control of their future—turning business problems into business solutions grounded in clarity, operational discipline, and human-centered leadership.

His path into healthcare leadership is uniquely shaped by frontline service. A retired firefighter-paramedic and former president and COO of a private EMS organization, Bert learned early that the systems behind care matter just as much as the care itself. That frontline-to-boardroom trajectory gives his work a rare blend of operational realism, empathy, and strategic rigor.

He holds dual graduate degrees (MS and MBA) from The University of Texas at Dallas. In addition to his advisory work, he serves as an Adjunct Professor of Graduate Healthcare Finance at the University of North Texas Health Science Center in Fort Worth, a Vocational EMS Instructor at Dallas College, and an active mentor for the American College of Healthcare Executives at both the local chapter and national levels, supporting the development of rising healthcare leaders across the country.

Bert’s leadership philosophy is simple but transformative: the future of healthcare depends on building more Clock Builders, not just more Time Tellers. He believes leaders have a responsibility to grow other leaders—through education, mentorship, and a life-long learner’s mindset—so that innovation isn’t a moment but a mindset. In a field as dynamic as healthcare, he champions the kind of leadership that creates systems, cultures, and people capable of sustaining real, lasting impact.

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