HPH NOWProfessor Robert Blendon Named Senior Associate Dean for Policy Translation and Leadership Development
Professor Robert Blendon, pictured at right, has been named Senior Associate Dean for Policy Translation and Leadership Development at HSPH. He will lead a new Division of Policy Translation and Leadership Development at the School.
In an email to the School on January 20, 2010, Dean Julio Frenk wrote: "The Division of Policy Translation and Leadership Development will oversee the activities that are currently underway in the Center for Health Communication, the Center for Continuing Professional Education, and the current Division of Public Health Practice, which will be renamed Center for Public Health Practice. In her new role as Assistant Dean for Research Communications, Robin Herman will also join the new Division. Through this new organization I expect to achieve greater efficiency of current efforts, while creating positive synergies that will pave the way for new knowledge translation initiatives."
Blendon will oversee the creation of a Harvard Health Forum, which will be modeled on the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum at the Harvard Kennedy School. Dean Frenk explained that Blendon, "will work with faculty who see opportunities to translate their research into better public health programs and policies. He will bring together faculty and public officials to research the effectiveness of public health programs and to improve those programs with research results. He will oversee our efforts to develop more high-level training programs for ministers of health and other leaders who influence public health globally. And he will collaborate with our faculty and outside experts to develop a robust knowledge repository of best public health practices and case studies that can be accessed by public health officials and researchers worldwide."
Blendon will assume the new position July 1, 2010.
-- Photo by Suzanne Camarata
