State of the School Address Offered Overview of HSPH and Announcement of Diversity Effort, October 26, 2007, Harvard Public Health NOW

Dean Bloom

For the sixth successive year, the HSPH community gathered in the Kresge cafeteria to hear about the School's recent accomplishments and future goals. The State of the School Address took place on Thursday, October 11. HSPH Deans Barry Bloom and James Ware delivered the address to a crowd of more than 300 members of the HSPH community.

"We all know that public health and the kind of work that we do isn't done by one person whose picture made it in the paper [or] who gets an award," said Dean Barry Bloom. "It's done by teams and groups of people, and that is the community that is in this room and in these buildings, and Jim and I again want to thank you tremendously for all that you do for us, and we hope that we are reciprocating with the resources to make this the most rewarding experience in your lives."

ANNUAL REPORT

Diversity Initiative

Dean Ware

Dean Ware announced the creation of a new Office of Diversity at the School, led by HSPH Professor Deborah Prothrow-Stith as Associate Dean for Diversity. (See upcoming profile in the next issue of Harvard Public Health NOW.)

"We're excited about this," said Dean Ware. "I've chaired the School's Diversity Committee the last several years. I have worked closely with a lot of my colleagues to make progress on this really important issue. And we - I think as a school - believe that we can raise this to another level of impact and success, and so all of us who have been involved in these activities intend to stand shoulder to shoulder with Deborah and to help her really have an impact in this area."

He also provided a sense of the demographics of the School. There are about 2,700 people at HSPH. Almost half of the School community consists of staff and research scientists. About a third of the community is students.

"Our school has a strong representation of women, and it's a very diverse community, racially and ethnically," said Dean Ware. "It's also noteworthy that the percentages of women are greatest in the student body and the staff, and lower in the faculty, and that also the staff and the student bodies are more diverse racially than the faculty. We have been hard at work on diversity and gender representation on our faculty. If you look at the trajectories, we're doing very, very well, and yet we recognize that there's room for considerable progress here, too."

Appointments

New faculty appointments have included Katherine Baicker, professor of health economics in the Department of Health Policy and Management, and four junior faculty: Maria Glymour, Assistant Professor of Society, Human Development, and Health; Quan Lu, Assistant Professor of Lung Biology; Armin Schwartzman, Assistant Professor of Biostatistics; and Marc Weisskopf, Mark and Catherine Winkler Assistant Professor of Environmental and Occupational Epidemiology.

There are also four new distinguished faculty visitors: Shiriki Kumanyika, Yerby Visiting Professor; Julio Frenk, Visiting Professor of International Health; Declan Doogan, Visiting Professor of the Practice of Biostatistics; and Winston Hide, Visiting Professor of Bioinformatics.

Dean Ware welcomed Christine Ciotti, Associate Dean for Human Resources, who will co-deliver the next HSPH Community Forum on November 15. The talk, "The Harvard Staff Survey One Year Later: HSPH's Response and Future Directions," will take place at 12 p.m. in Kresge G-2.

Ciotti helped establish the "Lunch on Us" program, where members of the School administration reward individuals seen engaged in a random act of kindness at HSPH. The reward is a card that may be used toward the purchase of food at Sebastian's Café.

Student Life

Wendy Ho of Government and Community Programs

There are a little more than 1,000 students at HSPH this year. The incoming class is 35 percent international students from 37 countries.

Dean Ware observed that HSPH student financial aid has increased at a rate of about five percent a year for the past five years and that next year the amount is expected to grow to $7.9 million. However, he emphasized the need to continue increasing amounts of student financial aid, "particularly in public health, in which so many of the careers do not generate the kind of income associated with medical specialties. So we recognize that's a big challenge."

Dean Ware welcomed the new HSPH Student Government officers: Marlene Camacho, DS, SHDH, treasurer; Haytham Kaafarani, MPH, HCM, secretary; Stephanie Cameron, MS2, HPM, vice president; Sean Dunbar, MS2, HPM, president.

"The Student Government has had quite an impact on our School within recent years," said Dean Ware. "For example, the very radical change in our academic calendar was initiated by discussions in the Student Government. And also the changes in our educational leadership that you'll hear about came out of feedback we received from students. So the Student Government really makes a difference here, and we're delighted that they're serving."

HSPH has new a Director of Student Affairs - Andrew Eisenmann - and an expanded and invigorated staff in Career Services under the direction of Peter Crudele.

Educational Programs and Accreditation

The HSPH Office for Educational Programs, which has a broad mandate to improve the educational experience of students, was established this year. The office is headed by HSPH Associate Deans Nancy Turnbull and Nancy Kane. To complement that change, the Office of Academic Affairs has been renamed the Office of Faculty Affairs. "What we're signaling with that name change is that this office now is going to have a much sharper focus on recruitment and retention of faculty and professional development, both for faculty and post-doctoral fellows," explained Dean Ware.

He also noted that the Office for Educational Programs is preparing HSPH for reaccreditation through the Council on Education for Public Health. The School received the maximum-length accreditation in the last review. The self-study is due in March 2009, and the accreditation visit will take place in fall 2009.

Communications and Information Technology

Anne Lusk of the Department of Nutrition

HSPH leads all schools of public health in scientific and media citations. From September 2006 to September 2007, HSPH was cited 865 times in major newspapers and 993 times on broadcast news. The Office of Communications also has hired a multimedia specialist, who has created podcasts, slide shows, and videos for the School.

Dean Bloom observed the terrific job done by Information Technology this past year through various initiatives. The School's home page was redesigned and a Content Management System launched to empower HSPH members to create and maintain web sites. IT also helped spearhead the design of a Global Research Ethics Map and an online database of hazardous materials at the School.

Finances and Resource Development

For the 22nd consecutive year, the School has finished the year in the black. Dean Bloom noted concerns about the "flattened" budget of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which provides federal research grants. The School experienced a budget increase of more than 10 percent last year - the highest of the research institutions at Harvard - with much of the increase due to the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. At some point, Dean Bloom predicted, the PEPFAR funding will go directly to the countries receiving aid, but he hopes that HSPH can continue being involved in related research and training.

HSPH received approximately $11 million in new gifts and pledges last year, of which $2 million was donated by School alumni. Those gifts included funding from Julie Henry, HSPH alumna, and James Usdan, member of the Health Policy and Management Executive Council.

AGENDA FOR 2007-08

University Administration

Kirkpatrick Tans of the Division of Public Health Practice

Harvard University President Drew Faust, Lincoln Professor of History, was installed on October 12, 2007. Dean Bloom noted additional changes at the University, including the appointment of three new deans; the establishment of a School of Engineering and Applied Sciences; and the appointment of Tamara Rogers as Vice President for Alumni Affairs and Development.

Dean Bloom described a University-wide committee called HUSEC comprised of the deans of the science schools, FAS, HMS, HSPH, and scientists in physics, math, and the biological sciences in Harvard's schools and hospitals who are experts or leaders in their research. Their goal is to establish incremental slots for University-wide nonschool, nondepartmently-restricted, interdisciplinary research and recruitment, said Dean Bloom. He added, "Solving big problems is no longer easy with one discipline or one faculty, and Harvard is putting a lot of resources, and will continue to do so, into fostering interdisciplinary science."

Allston

Plans for a science campus in Allston continue to be discussed by the University and the City of Boston. It remains undecided at this time if HSPH will move, but Dean Bloom acknowledged some potential advantages to having the School on the new campus, including a more unified HSPH campus, improved work and study spaces, and improved connectivity to other parts of the University to aid collaborations.

Academic Priorities and Initiatives

The number one academic priority at HSPH is to be able to increase the percentage of resources given to financial aid, said Dean Bloom, echoing sentiments expressed earlier by Dean Ware.

Dean Bloom also briefly described three areas of interdisciplinary research at the School that he expects will keep HSPH at the frontier of science: genes and environment; quantitative health sciences/bioinformatics; and global health.

Q&A

The State of the School Address ended with questions from the audience that touched upon improving the value placed on teamwork among employees, planning for bike paths and childcare facilities on the Allston campus, leveling the distribution of student financial support across departments, establishing mentoring programs for non-faculty academic appointees, and fixing water fountains in Building 1.

In addition, Robin Herman, Assistant Dean for Communications, and Paul Riccardi, Dean for Administration and Operations, detailed a localized emergency that occurred in Building 1 on October 3, and how the School is reexamining its response and communication procedures as a result.

Dean Bloom concluded the Address by encouraging HSPH members to use the online Suggestion Box.

"Jim and I want to thank everybody for coming, but really for pulling together as a community, which is really very, very heartening," said Dean Bloom.