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Jay Noren, M.D. |
And with fund raising underway to construct a COPH building, continued recruitment of outstanding faculty and plans to roll out more educational programs, the future for UNMC’s newest college looks bright.
“It’s been a busy 15 months,” said Jay Noren, M.D., the college’s founding dean. “With the support we’ve received from across the University of Nebraska system and the enthusiastic, motivated faculty we have on hand, the college looks forward to continuing growth and productive collaboration with our public health agency colleagues in Nebraska and beyond.”
The college will seek formal approval today from the University of Nebraska Board of Regents to develop five departments, a new Ph.D. program and a new center.
The college is seeking formal approval for the following departments:
- Biostatistics;
- Environmental, Agricultural and Occupational Health;
- Epidemiology;
- Health Services Research and Administration; and
- Health Promotion, Social, and Behavioral Health.
The proposed Ph.D. program is environmental health, occupational health, and toxicology and the proposed center is the Center for Environmental Health and Toxicology.
UNMC Chancellor Harold M. Maurer, M.D., said Dr. Noren and his faculty have built a strong foundation in the college’s first 15 months.
“Dr. Noren and the college’s faculty have hit the ground running in terms of establishing the college as a viable and thriving institution,” Dr. Maurer said. “They are laying solid ground work that will allow the college to become a beacon on the public health landscape in Nebraska and beyond.”
The college, which was approved by the University of Nebraska Board of Regents in July 2006, will allow Nebraska to better address a variety of critical health-related issues such as emergency preparedness, emerging and pandemic diseases such as SARS and the avian flu, health disparities, and increasing public health risks such as obesity, substance abuse, smoking, poor nutrition, inadequate physical activity and other chronic disease risks.
There are only 38 public health colleges currently in the United States and the UNMC college is the only one in a large region of the country bordered by Washington, Iowa, Oklahoma and Minnesota.
When the college went into full operation in January, its faculty included 20 full-time members at UNMC and an additional 15 faculty from UNO teaching in the Master of Public Health degree offered jointly by the two campuses.
Since then the college added nine new full-time faculty members, including:
- Three epidemiologists from Harvard University, Case Western Reserve University and Columbia University, respectively;
- Two health services research and administration faculty from Virginia Commonwealth University and the University of Iowa, respectively;
- Two biostatisticians from the University of Connecticut and UNL, respectively;
- An environmental-agricultural-occupational health expert from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health; and
- A health promotion and disease prevention expert from Ohio State University and the Australian Cancer Council Research Institute.
Additionally about 10 more faculty from other UNMC colleges, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) and the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO) have joint appointments in the College of Public Health.
During the next two years the college will recruit 11 additional faculty in the fields of epidemiology, health services research and administration, biostatistics, environmental-agricultural-occupational health and health promotion and disease prevention.
“We already have been able to recruit outstanding faculty and continuing to do so will be a key to the college fulfilling its potential,” Dr. Noren said.
In terms of education, the joint UNO/UNMC Master of Public Health Degree program has served as a solid platform for the college to build upon. The program launched its sixth year this fall with 100 students enrolled. Thirty students have graduated since the program’s inception.
This fall the program recently added a new concentration in biostatistics-epidemiology to go along with the health administration and community health education/health promotion concentrations it already offered.
Aside from the proposed environmental health, occupational health, and toxicology program the college also has developed proposals for Ph.D. programs in:
- Health services research, health policy, and health administration; and
- Health promotion and disease prevention research.
Proposals for these programs will be submitted for consideration by the Board of Regents early in 2008 and college officials hope to have students enrolled in the programs by the fall of 2008 with a few students possibly starting as early as spring 2008.
“We have started to develop important educational programs that will prepare our graduates to face the major public health issues that will confront them when they enter the professional ranks,” Dr. Noren said.
On the research front, the college currently boasts more than $5 million in extramural funding that supports a broad range of research and training activities. That funding composes more than half of the college’s current budget and reflects a large amount of collaborative research with faculty and other colleges at UNMC and other campuses.
“We already are conducting exciting and important research and will certainly undertake more cutting-edge research endeavors as we grow,” Dr. Noren said.
The number one priority on UNMC’s capital plan is the construction of an on-campus building to house the college. Currently college faculty and staff are housed in several different locations on the UNMC campus and in nearby rental space.
The estimated cost to construct a COPH building is $15 million. A campus location for the proposed building has been selected and preliminary plans for the building have been drafted. The proposed site for the building is on 40th Street, just to the south of the UNMC Eye Clinic on Dewey Avenue.
Early plans call for the building to provide space for 40 faculty, laboratories, conference and seminar rooms as well as distance education and distance conferencing capacity.
Additionally, the UNL College of Architecture and the COPH are discussing providing an educational opportunity for architecture students to engage in initial design of the COPH building.
“During its first 15 months the college has enjoyed the support of all partner colleges on the UNMC campus as well as much interest and collaboration from all three of the other NU campuses,” Dr. Noren said. “While the college has thus far taken only the initial steps towards its ultimate goals, this support provides the basis for continued growth and development.”