Profs in Print Training Extends Scholarly Insights
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NEWS FROM THE MAILMAN SCHOOL 3 PROFS IN PRINT TRAINING EXTENDS SCHOLARLY INSIGHTS his past December, Tal Gross, PhD, took to the pages of The Washington Post with a bold declara- tion. “This year, I resolve to ban laptops from my classroom,” pledged the assistant professor of THealth Policy and Management. His op-ed garnered a whop- ping 633 comments, and those responses gave Gross, who has since penned pieces for Al Jazeera America and The Hill, a glimmer of the influence wielded by public intellectuals. Gross was a member of the inaugural class of Public Voices Fellows, a yearlong initiative that brings Columbia faculty together with journalists for mentoring, discussion, and col- laboration. Intended to expand the breadth and quality of ideas that appear in influential media, Public Voices helps faculty members like Gross extend their reach in the market- place of ideas. “Researchers, as a whole, need to have a voice beyond the university’s boundaries,” says Gross. “Working all year with my writing coach, I learned how to translate my research into a story to reach new audiences.” This past spring, six new faculty members from across the Mailman School began their fellowships, with support from Columbia’s Lerner Center for Public Health Promo- tion. The goals of the Public Voices Fellowship run tandem to those of the Lerner Center, says Chair of Sociomedi- cal Sciences Lisa Metsch, PhD, a member of the Center. “Mailman School faculty have an enormous role to play in raising the visibility of public health scholarship,” she says. “One of the Center’s goals is to take academic insights out of the library and put them to work improving population health. The new media landscape is filled with possibility, and I am delighted that our faculty have an opportunity to be- come pioneers there.” Karolynn Siegel, PhD, of Psychiatric, Neurologic and Ayaga A. Bawah, Les Roberts, PhD, associate HONOR ROLL professor of Sociomedical Behavioral Genetics. PhD, assistant professor of professor of Population and Sciences, named to the Population and Family Health, Family Health, awarded the Steering Committee of the Quarraisha Abdool Karim, nominated to serve on the Robert H. Kirschner Award A SAMPLING OF National Human Genome MS ’88, PhD, professor of board of the Tamale Teaching for Global Activism by the Research Institute’s Center Clinical Epidemiology, award- Hospital of the University Heartland Alliance’s Marjorie FACULTY AWARDS for Research on the Ethical, ed the 2014 TWAS-Lenovo of Development Studies in Kovler Center. Legal and Social Implications Science Prize. northern Ghana. 4 2015 EDITION mailman.columbia.edu ments, interviews, and data GIANT LEAP from a GPS tracking device in participants’ cars—will LERNER CENTER DIRECTOR NAMED EXIT 65 investigate such issues as prescription drug use GINA WINGOOD, ScD, STUDY COLLECTS DATA ON and deteriorating vision, MPH, an expert in circumstances surround- gender- and culture- ELDERLY DRIVERS ing driving cessation, and appropriate HIV mobility options for those prevention interventions, who no longer drive. has been named founding BY THE YEAR 2029, “To many older adults, director of Columbia’s MORE THAN driving is essential for mobil- Lerner Center for Public ONE ity and independence,” says Health Promotion. The IN FIVE Guohua Li, MD, DrPH, a Center is one of three established by AMERICANS professor of Epidemiology Meatless Mondays founder Sid Lerner— WILL HAVE and principal investigator a member of the Mailman School Board CELEBRATED THEIR for Longroad. “This project of Overseers—and his wife, Helaine. “By 65TH BIRTHDAY; most will provide us much-needed cross-fertilizing marketing insight and will continue driving for and six other institutions. insights into how to help public health fact, Sid’s vision is helping many years to come. To The 5-year, $12 million older adults retain their driv- us take the next giant leap in public health understand their needs, project will track 3,000 ing privilege as long as they promotion,” says Wingood, who is also a the AAA Foundation for active drivers aged 65 to safely can, and how to pro- professor of Sociomedical Sciences. “Given Traffic Safety has launched 79 in California, Colorado, vide them with comfortable the breadth of research unfolding in key Longitudinal Research on Maryland, Michigan, and and convenient transporta- areas like nutrition, tobacco control, and Aging Drivers (Longroad) New York. The study— tion alternatives when they obesity prevention, this opportunity could with the Mailman School comprising annual assess- stop driving.” not be more timely.” VISITING PROFESSOR OF EPIDEMIOLOGY access. “Public health is intrinsi- ACTION ITEM JACK GEIGER, AN ORIGINATOR OF THE cally political and will become COMMUNITY HEALTH CENTER MODEL more political in the decade or CALDERONE PRIZE IN THE UNITED STATES, WAS AWARDED so to come,” said Geiger in THE 2014 FRANK A. CALDERONE PRIZE, his Calderone Prize lecture. administered by the Mailman School since 1992 and created “We have to talk to the to raise the profile of public health by celebrating an individual public, give legislative tes- who embodies its extraordinary possibilities. Today community timony at every level, flood health centers serve 23 million patients at 9,000 sites across the blogosphere, write let- the country, using a model Geiger and his collaborators piloted ters to the editor, and raise in the 1960s to give care to those who otherwise would not have our voices.” HONOR ROLL Frederica Perera, MPH ’76, DrPH Stephen S. Morse, PhD, Virginia Rauh, ScD, professor Diana Hernández, PhD, assistant ’82, PhD ’12, founding director of professor of Epidemiology, named of Population and Family Health, professor of Sociomedical Sciences, the Columbia Center for Children’s to the National Science Advisory invited to give the MIND Institute named a JPG Environmental Health Environmental Health, awarded a 2015 Board for Biosecurity of the National Distinguished Lecture at the Fellow at the Harvard University Heinz Award for the Environment. Institutes of Health. University of California, Davis. School of Public Health. Robert Fullilove, EdD, professor Population and Family Health Alfredo Morabia, MD, Associate Professor of Health of Sociomedical Sciences, appointed professors Marina Catallozzi, MD, PhD, professor of Epidemiology, Policy and Management Y. Claire by Governor Andrew Cuomo to a MSc, and Karen Soren, MD, each named editor-in-chief of the Wang, MD, ScD, awarded a Robert task force to end the AIDS epidemic named a Best Doctor 2015 in New American Journal of Public Health. Wood Johnson Foundation Health in New York. York Magazine. Policy Fellowship for 2015–2016. 5 OR THE LAST FOUR YEARS, a core component of the orientation for incoming Master of Public Health students has been a module known as Self, Social, and Global Awareness (ssga). Introduced KNOW F as part of extensive curriculum revisions in fall 2012, ssga is designed to heighten self-awareness about the power and privileges that exist based on identity—gender, race, age, sexual orientation, and THYSELF religion, among other categories—and to demonstrate how they affect PROGRAM population health. The program was developed says Adichie, because they affect not only our thoughts and PROMOTES by a team led by Dr. Cheryl feelings, but often our actions, as well. Moreover, such views are Franks, an expert in diversity often subconscious, complicating and limiting our ability to work REFLECTION and anti-racism training, with productively. In 2014, students saw the Pulitzer Prize–winning play Dean of Students Marlyn Disgraced, then discussed with members of the cast the themes of AND SELF- Delva, EdD, a lecturer in cultural assimilation, deception, and identity explored in the script. Epidemiology, and Associate AWARENESS Dean for Field Practice Linda Cushman, PhD, a professor of SSGA IS A CENTERPIECE OF THE Population and Family Health. ssga continues to evolve with the addition of new events includ- SCHOOL’S MISSION NOT ONLY TO ing lectures, small-group discussions, and theater outings. “Each year, we’ve thought to expand it and simultaneously respond to BE AWARE OF AND UNDERSTAND student feedback,” says Cushman. “It’s a living, breathing thing.” For 2015–16, components of ssga have been incorporated into SOCIAL INEQUITIES BUT TO DEVELOP Integration of Science and Practice, small-group sessions in which students meet throughout the year to discuss case studies that STRATEGIES TO ELIMINATE THEM. integrate traditional classroom education and the real-world ex- By the end of 2017, all faculty will also have been exposed to perience of working as a public health professional. Also new this the program. “ssga is a wonderful and critical first step toward year, doctoral and MS students were welcome to participate. the Mailman School community embracing and prioritizing our The fall 2015 kickoff event featured “The Danger of a Single discussion of structural power arrangements,” says Cushman. Story,” a 2009 TED talk by novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, “I am very pleased with how far we’ve come, but we have a lot in which the author explores the influence of the “single stories” we more work to do in our classrooms, in the School, and on the hold about others. Such stories are incomplete and even dangerous, macro level, in society in general.” RACE TO THE TOP INEQUALITY UNDER SIEGE Amidst the outcry sparked by events in Ferguson and Staten Island, students explored public health’s role in reducing violence. “We already know these health disparities exist,” said Whitney Skillen, MPH ’16. “We want to investigate what police brutality and racism have to do with it.” Students led the charge for #BlackLivesMatter to inform discussions in Mailman School classrooms. 6 2015 EDITION mailman.columbia.edu Last year amid the Ebola outbreak, you DESIGN TEAM co-authored an essay in The American PARTNERSHIP FOR GOOD HEALTH Journal of Bioethics calling to task BIG QUESTION officials who require placebo controlled randomized clinical trials (RCT) to PHYSICAL ACTIVITY PREVENTS TRIAL DYNAMICS assess emerging treatments.