I wish all our students the best of outcomes in their finals and end of the year activities. I look forward to seeing some of you on graduation day.

A week in the life of a dean

This has been an extremely busy but interesting week in which I have raced from meeting to meeting, been to Kannapolis for events, been chairing the search committee for Kenan-Flagler Business School’s dean, read a citation for the 2008 Thomas Jefferson Award and attended dinner for Chancellor (to name just a few examples). I’ll tell you about some of them.

Thursday and Friday in Kannapolis

As many readers know, David Murdock, who formerly owned Cannon Mills and now Dole Foods, is building the North Carolina Research Campus in Kannapolis, NC. We, along with researchers from Duke, UNC-Charlotte, UNC-Greensboro, A&T, NC State, and some other schools will have space, as will some related businesses. The goal is to revitalize Kannapolis with a state-of-the-science research campus (www.ncresearchcampus.net).

As you drive into Kannapolis, historically dominated by Cannon Mills, you see soaring, new, stately buildings, rising from the ashes of razed mill buildings, breathing life, hope and excitement into this community.

Dr. Steven Zeisel, Kenan Distinguished Professor of Nutrition, is leading the effort to create the UNC School of Public Health’s Nutrition Research Institute. The laboratories there will be headed by faculty members appointed at UNC Chapel Hill. They will study metabolomics and related areas to uncover how individuals differ in their nutritional profiles and how that might influence prevention and treatment of a variety of conditions and diseases, such as obesity, diabetes and cancer.

Dr. Ed Baker and his NC Institute for Public Health team are working closely with the Cabarrus County Health Department to create a 21st century health department that would link public health and public health science, hopefully on the campus there.

It’s very exciting, and I am glad our school is part of the Kannapolis project. I hope many students will have the opportunity to do research and internships there. If students, staff and faculty want to visit Kannapolis, we could consider arranging a bus tour in the fall.

Reception at the new David H. Murdock Core Laboratory Building

We hosted a reception for our Public Health Foundation Board, area alumni and people interested in what we were doing. It was an exciting evening as we got a chance to see the first almost completed building, truly a majestic, awesome structure. The 311,000-square-foot building will feature a core laboratory containing a strategic array of state-of-the-art scientific equipment. It will be available for use by any research institute or company located on the research campus.

I was pleased to meet so many alumni who are excited about the School’s directions, who say we are better than ever and they want to connect or reconnect with the School. I always enjoy meeting alumni and hearing their recollections of the School. Many thanks to Dixie Brink and Cutler Andrews on our external affairs staff and Beverly Jordan on the Kannapolis staff for their hard work putting together this event – the first in the Core Lab Building.

2008 Thomas Jefferson Award

I was thrilled to have organized a group of four deans, a faculty scientist and a Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center leader to nominate Dr. Shelley Earp for the Thomas Jefferson Award, and even happier that he was selected. By the way, when I do something like this, usually, someone in my office is to be thanked for helping to stay on top of people for letters and working with me to organize the package. In this case, it was Jenny Lewis. Friday, at the Faculty Council, I read the citation, and Chancellor Moeser presented the award to Dr. Earp. As Lineberger Professor and Director of the cancer center, Shelley has been an amazing leader, a visionary who is responsible for UNC receiving the University Cancer Research Fund from our legislature, and a real friend of the School.

Celebration of Chancellor Moeser

Friday night, I attended a magnificent event to thank Chancellor and Susan Moeser for their leadership of this University. It was a magical evening. I was so impressed how many of the evening’s speeches remarked about the Chancellor’s strength, character, willingness to take tough stands to support academic freedom, but also his kindness, decency and unequivocal commitment to academic excellence. I could not agree more. There’s nothing combative or antagonistic about the Chancellor; yet, he exudes tremendous strength and moral toughness. He’s made this University a better place. During my time as dean, I have been gratified by his support of this School.

In the news

This week, health disparities were front and center in the news, with publication of an article in PLoS Medicine. As Kevin Sack wrote in The New York Times Sunday 4/27, “ …the rising tide of American health is not lifting all boats, and there are widening gaps in life expectancy, based on the interwoven variables of income, race, sex, education and geography.” Life expectancy declined in many counties from 1983-1999. A fundamental job of public health is to erase these disparities. Our job is getting both more urgent and more difficult.

REMINDER:

Don’t forget to vote. It’s about the future.

Health care reform

(April 14) Tonight, Dr. Jon Oberlander, Associate Professor of Health Policy and Administration, School of Public Health, and Associate Professor of Social Medicine, School of Medicine, will give the Foard Lecture, our school’s most prestigious lecture. It’s really exciting that nearly 500 people have registered for the event. Jon will focus on health care reform and the presidential campaigns. This is exactly the kind of forum our school should be hosting. Health care reform is a highly contentious issue yet one Americans care deeply about. Just today, a New York Times article detailed changes in insurance policies that have resulted in higher payments by consumers for drugs. Since some of these drugs are life-saving but very expensive, it means that even people with insurance now are experiencing skyrocketing costs of health care. While the poor and near-poor are especially disadvantaged by the health care crisis, no one is immune from its consequences.

It’s almost inconceivable that 36 years ago, when I was getting my MPH in Medical Care Organization and Health Education at the University of Michigan, we memorized key components of various health insurance bills before Congress (I believe there were more than 12 at the time.). The mantra was, “not if but when.” I doubt any of our professors would have predicted that we’d still be talking 36 years later.

It’s important to me that our school foster productive dialogue, perform relevant policy analyses, teach our students about the issues, conduct demonstrations that might lead to tested components of a program and advise candidates and other influentials. Obviously, it’s the details that matter. Any plan must address topics like quality of care, access and provide incentives for prevention. I look forward to hearing what Jon Oberlander has to say about the issues. He authored two very thoughtful New England Journal of Medicine articles on these issues last fall. (Article 1, Article 2)

Surely, in this country, we can find a way to balance competing interests and finally declare access to health care a right not a privilege. It’s what professors like Sy Axelrod, Roy Penchansky and Avedis Donabedian taught me, and I still believe it.

New logo

I want to share with you the new version of our logo that the School will adopt in September 2008. Some people think we are dropping “UNC” from our name – nothing could be farther from the truth, for many reasons! I hope that sharing the new logo will ease some people’s minds and show that UNC still is very much a part of our name. (I realize some people still will not be comfortable.) While we may be adding two words to our name, our mission remains the same – to improve public health, promote individual well-being, and eliminate health disparities across North Carolina and around the world.

Happy Monday! Best, Barbara

A statement repeated around town in the last couple weeks concerns me greatly: The gist is that my blog isn’t really a blog, because we don’t post comments, and I don’t really want feedback. Nothing could be further from my intentions. I write to address these issues and share a draft comment policy on which I welcome comments.

Why I blog

My integrity is about my most important possession. I don’t write this blog to be a mouthpiece for official positions or to “spin” administrative messages. I started the blog, because I wanted another communication channel for me, the School and beyond. At one time, all the School’s faculty, staff and students could convene for a barbecue in Dean Rosenau’s front yard or the front steps of the Rosenau Building, as many alumni recall with fondness and wistfulness. We’re too big for that now. The blog is partly a way of extending to a broader community the conversations I would like to have with many of you individually. I welcome both positive and negative comments as I have said on many occasions.

One of my goals as dean is to foster discussion about difficult topics. I hope this blog will spark some of these. Now that I have been doing the blog for awhile, there’s another reason I keep it up. Photographers sometimes say they are better observers, because their cameras make them so. Similarly, I find that thinking about the blog and what I will write makes me listen more intently, read materials I might not otherwise have read and formulate opinions that might have gone unstated.

Over the last few weeks, I have contacted bloggers I respect and asked them about their review policies. I have gone to the websites of blogs from other schools, industry, the DTH and Huffington Post. There is general agreement that there must be some moderation to assure that spam is not posted (I get dozens of spams every day, and many of them are sexually explicit.), and that comments that defame other individuals or are racially or otherwise discriminatory don’t get through. Frankly, this takes time, and Mae Beale helps me do it. It is possible that every now and then an honest message will be missed in the spam. If so, I regret it, and assure you, my readers, that it will be a rare event. Get back to me if you don’t see a post. In a couple of cases, I have responded directly to an individual and asked if this cleared up the issue, and if they still wanted us to post their comment. We followed their preference. I never want to embarrass someone by pointing out that they misunderstood me or were misinformed.

A few weeks ago, the format of the blog changed. To my surprise and chagrin, I learned today that during this process, comments were removed for a week or so while they were being transferred to the new system. This has been resolved. In the future, changes will not be made without notifying me first so I can inform readers. I apologize to all anyone whose comments disappeared during this time. They were restored by early March.

That’s the background. Here’s the policy I crafted after getting the input described above. The policy statement will appear on the site menu. . Thanks to the DTH, Bernard Glassman, Huffington Post and the brilliant Paul Jones for input. Let me know if you have any suggestions about this policy. Consider it a draft for now.

Draft comment policy

I review and must approve all comments posted to my blog, primarily to keep out spam. We do not censor comments based on political or ideological points of view. We encourage divergent points of view, respectfully stated. We will not post comments that are abusive, off-topic, use foul language, or include ad hominem attacks. Because of the sheer amount of spam, it may take a couple of days before we post a comment. I may not respond to every comment individually. In some cases, I will respond through the subsequent week’s blog posting. In such cases, so as not to violate confidentiality, I will not mention the sender by name but will repeat the issue that prompted the comment.

I take full responsibility for what is written here. I will acknowledge my mistakes. If we alter published posts to correct mistakes, we will indicate that this has been done. Monday Morning represents my point of view. I am not speaking on behalf of the University nor the School as a whole, nor on behalf of the faculty, nor the staff, nor the students.

The outcome:

(April 6, 2008) I wrote the rest of this piece Saturday, but the game Saturday night changed everything. I suspect that there are a lot of people in Chapel Hill this morning (Sunday) who are stunned, wondering what happened last night when we were slammed by Kansas. My spinning class Sunday morning had the feeling of people in shock. But the fact is that this is a great team, as the women’s team is, and it’s time to move on. Next year, we all will start with fresh hopes and dreams. Meanwhile, let’s be proud of how far these teams came!

The weekend:

As I drove to my office this afternoon, I was captivated by the sheer beauty of Chapel Hill at the height of spring. After several days of rain, the redbuds and crepe myrtles are magnificent in their intense pinks and purples. (I am torn between working on slides and buying the dwarf crepe myrtle I want.) Franklin Street reverberated with a sense of expectancy. Everywhere, people in light blue were coming out of the local shops with Final Four shirts, the portable bathrooms are ready, and it seems as if everyone just wants the games to begin. Soon enough I am in my office working but determined to be home to watch the game.

Anniversary of Martin Luther King’s assassination:

There’s been a lot of press this week about Dr. King’s assassination. When I read his speeches and think about his life, I am awed by his vision and also by how young he was when he died. What a loss. It’s hard to believe that it’s been 40 years since that awful day. I was a sophomore at the University of Michigan, and the campus was devastated. As my baby boomer colleagues remember, it was a time of great ferment. Another war was raging, one that also was unpopular. Martin Luther King’s assassination catapulted nearby Detroit into riots but raised the consciousness of many students about the gap between our ivory towers and the country at large. Two years later, in my senior year, thousands of students from around the campus (including me) boycotted classes for eight days under the banner of the Black Action Movement (BAM) to lobby university president Fleming for greater diversity. The Michigan Daily reported that “the strike came to an end when negotiations between BAM and the administration resulted in a commitment made by the University to work toward 10 percent black student enrollment by 1973. BAM and the administration also agreed to additional BAM demands, all designed to create a better atmosphere for minority students.

Curious about how the BAM, in which I’d been active, was viewed by history, I found myself pouring over archives available via Google. I was intrigued by what then President Angell had said about the university in 1879 (Cantor, N, Introduction in Gurin et al., Defending Diversity. University of Michigan Press, 2004).

“Good learning is always catholic and generous. It welcomes the humblest votary of science and bids him kindle his lamp freely at the common shrine. It frowns on caste and bigotry. It spurns the artificial distinctions of conventional society. It greets all comers whose intellectual gifts entitle them to admission to the goodly fellowship of cultivated minds. It is essentially democratic in the best sense of that term….. Let not a misapplication of the laissez-faire doctrine in political economy, which has its proper place, lead us to the fatal mistake of building up a pedantic aristocracy.”
–James B. Angell, president of the University of Michigan, June 25, 1879, Commencement address

So, you’re wondering, am I advocating that our students boycott classes or storm the President’s office? Unequivocally, I am not. I am affirming my hope that we are bound by a commitment to achieve Martin Luther King’s vision, and that we will be outspoken, when being outspoken can make a positive difference. Even today, in our School, data show that we have room to improve not only the proportion of minorities who comprise our students, faculty and staff but in the appropriate mix of content in courses and the welcoming atmosphere we create in our school, campus and classes. Let’s all work harder at this!

Who would believe it?

Last Saturday’s New York Times article by Robert Pear reported that “Johns Hopkins University said Friday that it had programmed its computers to ignore the word ‘abortion’ in searches of a large, publicly financed database of information on reproductive health after federal officials raised questions about two articles in the database. The dean of the Public Health School lifted the restrictions after learning of them.” I’m really proud of Michael Klag, dean of the Bloomberg School of Public Health who stopped this practice when he learned about it. Klag said that the school is “dedicated to the advancement and dissemination of knowledge and not its restriction.” I could not agree more! (FYI - Google News Search for articles related to this story)

Happy Monday. Best, Barbara