Arts & Sciences and Trinity College
Exactly the Combination of Scholars I Need
Social epidemiologist Sherman James joined the Sanford Institute
as the Susan Bennett King Professor of Public Policy Studies, a
Nicholas Faculty Leadership Initiative chair. James, who came from
the University of Michigan’s School of Public Health but was
conducting research in North Carolina, is interested in the “life-course
social and economic determinants of African Americans’ strong
predisposition to develop diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease
early in adult life.”
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Professor Sherman James and Assistant Professor Kathryn
Whetten investigate regional and global health policy.
Arts & Sciences and Trinity College
Campaign Total: $417,977,713
Trinity College, with approximately 5,300 undergraduates as
well as the graduate school, raised more than $80 million
in financial aid to perpetuate Duke’s “need-blind”
undergraduate admission policy. It also added nearly $18 million
in PhD graduate fellowship funds. Thirty-nine professorial
chair endowments were established, providing vital income
for teaching across the disciplines. Programmatic funds assured
continuation of interdisciplinarity, as did record Annual
Fund giving of more than $65 million.
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James’s arrival reflects Duke’s growing emphasis on
health policy and the new Health Inequalities Program, directed
by Kathryn Whetten. Whetten joined the Sanford Institute’s
faculty in 1995 and studies factors that contribute to the high
transmission and low treatment rates of HIV in the rural South.
“When the epidemic began,” she says, “we had people
engaged in their own care but not much treatment to offer them.
Now we have lots of treatment options, but many people disengaged
from their own care.” HIV in the South “mirrors what’s
going on in less wealthy countries,” she adds. “It is
a disease of the poor,” primarily affecting less educated
and other marginalized populations.
“The central question for an epidemiologist,” James
says, is “What factors are responsible for group inequalities
in health?” In a public policy context, researchers also ask
what can be done about it. In many traditional academic settings,
“you publish a paper and nothing happens,” according
to Whetten. At the Sanford Institute, “you figure out how
your research translates into policy, then work with legislators
and state agencies to solve problems.” Private support has
enabled Whetten to improve HIV patients’ access to mental
health care at North Carolina public health clinics.
The opportunity to use his research to effect change was a reason
James came to Duke. Another was the emphasis on cross-disciplinary
scholarship. “The Sanford Institute brings together expertise
in political science, economics, history, psychology, medicine,
ethics, and public policy. This is exactly the combination of scholars
I need to be in daily contact with,” James says. Whetten adds,
“It would be hard to build the kind of multidisciplinary research
team I need elsewhere.” And because “education, politics,
and international policy are all factors in public health,”
she finds it invaluable to be able to connect with “policy-oriented
faculty pursuing a range of related issues.”
The Sanford Institute’s expansion will make it easier for
James and Whetten to participate in these kinds of cross-disciplinary
conversations. “There is important work to be done with health
policy on a regional and global level,” James says. “I’m
interested in participating in as many of these conversations as
I possibly can.”e
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