Dear Colleagues,

As always, thank you for helping one another, continuing to produce new work, and for taking pride in the community we have built here at SPH. These are frustrating and anxious days.

On a lighter note, I am pleased to announce the winners of the inaugural Dean’s Innovation Challenge award. They are:

  • Monica Wang (faculty); Matthew Motta (faculty); Selenne Alatorre (staff); Willa Rose (student). “Disrupting Weight Loss Supplement Misinformation: An Influencer-Led Intervention”
  • Huimin Cheng (faculty); Vedika Srivastava (staff). “Real-Time Data-Driven Early Warning System for Public Health Emergencies”
  • Meredith Brooks (faculty); Jiujia Zhang (student); Lauren Linde (student); Leonardo Martinez (faculty). “Co-designing an App to increase the efficiency of Mobile screening Programs for TuBerculosis (CAMP-TB)”
  • Debbie Cheng (faculty); Sarah Bagley (faculty); Amy Yule (faculty); Kimberly Nelson (faculty); Nina Cesare (staff);Christina Freibott (student). “Development of a Peer Overdose Intervention and Training Program for High School Students: An Equity-Centered Approach.”

I look forward to seeing the results of their work later this year.

Federal News

NIH study sections and advisory councils have not been meeting over the past month in part because they were not being included in advance in the Federal Register, a prerequisite to such meetings. Under the Federal Advisory Committee Act, study sections need to be announced in the Federal Register 15 days in advance of meeting. This “missed step” has caused a backlog of grant proposals to be reviewed.

Therefore, new NIH grants have essentially not be awarded in the past month. The longer these delays continue, the larger the magnitude of the problem for researchers everywhere. The new Secretary of HHS can bring on personnel to help clear the backlog. The NIH is keeping a list of study sections that have not been taking place as planned, including ODHS:

We continue to wait for a national budget and judicial decisions to unfreeze the current situation.

In other troubling news, the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) will post a notice in the Federal Register this week that asserts it is rescinding its policy on public participation in rulemaking. Currently, HHS proposes rules (a Notice of Public Rulemaking), the public is invited to submit comments in a specific time frame, the agency reviews the comments, and then the agency issues a final rule that may incorporate some of the feedback. You have seen this in action with the agency making updates to proposed changes to NIH’s data sharing policy, HHS’s human subject protection rules.

There are concerns that this new HHS plan will allow the agency to unilaterally act and limit the public’s ability to seek redress against errant policies. Various professional associations are likely to push back.

Communications Resources

Our MarCom team is creating exciting new content based on SPH investigators and their work to highlight the critical role of federal investment in health research. The framing for each piece of content is, Your Health Depends on Federal Research Funding. We are creating multiple videos, editorial stories, and email campaigns to amplify this message. The success of this initiative depends on engagement and partnership with our faculty and researchers. MarCom will produce and share the content, but we are actively seeking easily understood examples of federally funded, SPH research to highlight. Please reach out to Cara Willis and Mike Saunders about your work and they will be in contact with you.

I am re-sharing the MarCom FAQ section of the website. We include online safety links from the Committee to Protect Journalists, PEN America, and the resources from BU PR that they mentioned during last week’s School Assembly. The SPH MarCom team will continue doing everything possible to promote our work where the vast majority of people get their information, while balancing the increasingly dangerous and hostile environment towards academia across social media.

University Guidance

Guidance from the University Office of Sponsored Programs remains unchanged. Any concerns by PIs about non-renewal of federal grant funding, stop work orders, or notices of funding “pauses” should be directed to Dean McClean. PIs should not take personnel actions in response to anticipated federal funding disruptions without prior consultation with and approval from Sponsored Programs, which Dean McClean will help facilitate. Check for updates on the University’s online resource for updates about the 2025 administration transition.

All labor requests, travel, and external consultants on unrestricted funds (school money), gifts, and discretionary funds continue to fall under the budget controls and a request for approval is required. Please direct any questions to the Associate Dean for Administration and Finance, Dean Lazic at iralazic@bu.edu.

Finally, following the good attendance at last week’s discussion, we will be holding another virtual Open Forum for Faculty and Staff next Friday, March 14, from 12:00-1:00pm ET.

We are working to keep up with the changing landscape and will share additional updates and guidance as soon as we are able. In the meantime, feel free to reach out to me directly if you have questions.

Thank you,

Michael Stein
Dean ad interim
mdstein@bu.edu

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