An Introduction.
It is with tremendous excitement that I join Boston University School of Public Health this week. SPH has been a leader in academic public health for almost forty years and houses some of the best scholars and teachers in the world. It is a privilege to be joining this community, and I look forward to having the opportunity to meet everyone who is a part of the school over the coming months.
I am humbled to be following Dr. Bob Meenan in the role of dean. Dr. Meenan has been a giant in the field, a leader among other deans of schools of public health, and an important voice for the promotion of the health of the public for more than two decades. I wanted to start by acknowledging our collective debt to Dr. Meenan’s leadership, and my personal gratitude to him for his unstinting help with this transition. I also would like to note the enduring contributions of SPH’s founding dean, Norman Scotch, who passed away recently.
Our Collective Vision
As we look to the years ahead, we have much that we wish to accomplish. Centrally we want to build on what the school has already achieved, and together move to the next level. What does that look like? We will have several opportunities, starting with the upcoming School Assembly, to discuss this in coming months. Broadly speaking though, as I had articulated in my presentation to the school community during the dean search process, I see our great school as one that engages with the critical public health issues of our time; encourages innovative science, education, translation, and implementation efforts; and contributes to the global conversation on how to assure the conditions for people to be healthy. The challenge before us is how to do that at the highest possible level, accepting nothing less than excellence, and how to make sure that we together create a system that builds on our current strengths while supporting our future aspirations.
It is a challenge that we will meet together. In my presentation to the school community back in June, I mentioned my favorite definition of public health, from the Institute of Medicine report on The Future of Public Health:
“Public health is what we, as a society, do collectively to assure the conditions for people to be healthy.”
To me, this speaks to the role of academic public health as much as it does to public health practice. It needs to be, therefore, our collective aspiration to inform our research, education, and translation efforts with an awareness of our responsibility to contribute to improving the public’s health. I see it as my role to help us get there, together.
As a realist by disposition, I realize that much of this is easier said than done. I also, however, have boundless confidence in the capacity of a community of dedicated scholars, staff, and students to achieve shared goals. Clearly there is much to discuss, and I look forward to creating opportunities and spaces for a forward-looking conversation.
E-Communications
This week we launch several efforts towards starting a school-wide conversation about our next steps. You are reading this Dean’s Note as part of a revamped SPH This Week e-bulletin. SPH This Week will serve as a weekly update to the entire SPH community about upcoming events, announcements (policy changes, deadlines, notices, etc.), and achievements by members of our community, including awards, publications, and grants received. The Dean’s Note will lead each SPH This Week. This note very much reflects my thoughts. I intend this note to be a mix of ideas and topics that cross my desk and my mind on any given week. And although I may have some research assistance on some specific topics, the sentiments and words will be all mine. I expect that some notes will be, like this one, more procedural and inward-looking, concerning our school and our work within it. Other notes will be more outward looking, concerning events in the broader world, emerging scholarship in public health, and reflections about public health in the larger context. Some of these ideas may find their way to our external communications, but at core the Dean’s Notes will reflect my thoughts, relatively unfiltered, for the read of the SPH community. Some notes will be longer, others shorter. I realize that one problem with a Dean’s Note is it can become a “one-way communication,” i.e., I am writing and everyone is reading. My intent is quite the opposite. The core aim of my weekly note is to generate conversation. Centrally I want to hear what the school community thinks, and to use the note as a catalyst, and occasionally a provocation, to help propel us forward in our collective aspirations. To that end I welcome at any time your comments, reflections, arguments, and discussions about anything I write. It is one of the sentinel privileges of being part of an academic community that we debate each other’s ideas, using them to elevate our collective and individual work. I very much look forward to that.
SPH This Week will replace all other official communications from the dean’s office, in order to streamline everyone’s email flow. If you read SPH This Week, and check in on the SPH home page, you will be caught up. We will still be sending out SPH Today every morning as a simple update on that day’s events and to reiterate key themes from SPH This Week. You can also keep up to date via Twitter and Facebook. All departments and centers will continue to maintain their own communications, which will be relevant to faculty and staff in these units.
Electronic communication is only one type of communication that we need to begin to articulate and realize an ambitious agenda for the school’s future. To that end, we have moved to schedule several opportunities for in-person conversation.
Meetings for Faculty & Staff
For faculty and staff, we will be holding monthly school assemblies to allow the school more time as a community to discuss and debate issues. The assemblies will take place every fourth Thursday either in Hiebert Lounge or L-110 on January 22, February 26, March 26, April 23, and May 28. A buffet breakfast will begin at 8:45 a.m., followed by a meeting from 9 a.m. to 10:50 a.m. We will announce dates for the assemblies in the fall soon.
In addition, I am looking forward to meeting faculty and staff for individual conversations, beginning in my first few months as Dean. Ms. Justine de Marrais will be reaching out to faculty and staff directly in January to set up one-on-one meetings. If you are a faculty member, she will ask for your CV to help orient me to the work you are doing and make our meeting more productive.
In addition, I will also be hosting monthly drop-in breakfasts for faculty, providing an opportunity for ongoing informal interactions. For spring 2015 these meetings will be held in the Founders Room from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. on February 3, March 3, April 7, and May 5.
Student Gatherings
We will also have two opportunities to engage the student community in the conversation. I will be hosting coffee chats with students to hear about our students’ experiences and their vision for the School. For spring 2015 these meetings will be held in the Admissions Conference Room (Talbot 201 Center) from 5 p.m. to 5:50 p.m. on February 4, March 5, and April 1. We will also be hosting student meetings with the deans where academic deans and educational program staff will join me in discussing a more formal agenda, mirroring in many respects what we cover in the monthly school assemblies. These meetings will be held in L-303 from 5 p.m. to 5:50 p.m. on January 27, February 17, and March 17.
These plans are all, of course, first ideas about how we can promote an effective collective conversation. I fully expect that we will, in time, edit and refine these with an eye to optimizing our communication.
I look forward to our many ongoing discussions, and I welcome any and all reactions, feedback, and input in any form. I am on email consistently and look forward to hearing from you all.
I hope everyone has a terrific week. Until next week.
Warm regards,
Sandro
Sandro Galea, MD, DrPH
Dean and Professor, Boston University School of Public Health
@sandrogalea