UNMC welcomed University of Nebraska Regent Jack Stark, PhD, to the Omaha campus on July 14 for a tour and discussion on UNMC’s Summer Health Professions Education Program.
The SHPEP program is in its 20th summer at UNMC, bringing 80 college scholars to the Omaha campus from across the U.S. for an academic enrichment experience that builds students’ backgrounds in the health professions.
The six-week program – with the first two weeks virtual – is running now, thanks in large part to grant funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation that supports UNMC and 10 other universities.
On a tour with Interim Chancellor H. Dele Davies, MD, Stark visited a full lecture hall as SHPEP students heard a chemistry lecture and worked on their class exercise.
“That’s pretty inspiring,” Stark said.
Stark and Dr. Davies then joined a roundtable discussion on the program with Phil Covington, EdD, UNMC’s associate vice chancellor for student success, and Sonja Tutsch-Bryant, PhD, SHPEP program manager.
The featured speakers were three SHPEP alums who now work with the program at UNMC: Sam Moreno, who is originally from Illinois; Hailey Cheek, of Elkhorn; and Rolando Rico-Martinez, who is from Council Bluffs, Iowa.
After participating in SHPEP in summer 2022, all three went on to the Summer Undergraduate Research Program in 2023, gaining research experience through another of UNMC’s pathway programs. Rico-Martinez also participated in the UNMC High School Alliance and Urban Health Opportunities Program.
He will go on to medical school at UNMC this fall. Moreno will be attending the UNMC College of Public Health to study for her Master of Public Health degree.
Thanks to SHPEP, Moreno said, “The entire trajectory of my life changed.”
Stark encouraged the students, urging them to keep their focus and find a good mentor.
“You’re going to make it,” he told them. “You know the discipline. You’ve got the focus and then the compassion.”
Stark himself has a background in the medical professions and at UNMC. His professional expertise is as a sports psychologist, and he previously served on UNMC’s psychiatry and pediatrics faculty as a medical psychologist.
Stark said he’s extremely impressed with UNMC’s programs.
“We’re bringing young students from starting in middle school, high school, and preparing them for going into the health care professions,” Stark said. “We’ve got to do this. We don’t have enough students in this country, and the work they’re doing here is a national model, I think, for every other university health center. It’s very impressive.”
On his tour, Stark also visited the EDGE District and the new Catalyst building with Amy Thompson, UNMC’s director of campus development, and Michael Dixon, PhD, president and CEO of UNeMed.