Executive Vice Chancellor Eugene Washington presented the 2006 Martin Luther King Jr. Awards on January 17 to three individuals who have demonstrated extraordinary leadership to promote and advance diversity at UCSF.
This year's awards, in the faculty, staff and student categories, respectively, will go to:
- • Harvey Brody, director of the UCSF Faculty
Search Ambassador Program,
- • Martha Hooven, associate chair of administration
in the Department of Medicine, UCSF School of Medicine, and
- • Damon Francis, a fourth-year student in the
UCSF School of Medicine.
The campus community is invited to attend the awards ceremony, which is scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 17, from noon to 2 p.m., in Cole Hall, Medical Sciences Building on the UCSF Parnassus campus.
Harvey Brody
A 1963 graduate of the UCSF School of Dentistry, Brody has had a long and distinguished record of advancing diversity throughout his career at UCSF. He first joined UCSF as an assistant professor of oral biology in the dental school and as an assistant professor of community medicine in the medical school in 1965.
Most recently, Brody was selected to direct the Faculty Search Ambassador Program, which was initiated to remove the barriers to diversity of faculty at UCSF by the Academic Senate's Equal Opportunity Committee (EQOP) in 2002. Since taking on this position in March 2004, Brody "has gone beyond the job description of assisting faculty searches with increasing diversity through his extraordinary networking, energetic engagement and follow-through, and systems change thinking," says Francis Lu, a previous UCSF MLK awardee, current chair of the EQOP and one of his nominators. "He understands the need to focus on both the search processes, as well as the UCSF community's responsibility for diversity and need for accountability of its leadership."
His commitment to diversity has led him to try out several innovative ideas. For example, Brody traveled to several national meetings and identified several possible candidates for a particular search.
"Even after a short time, hard data already indicate his effectiveness; searches in which he was involved hired substantially more underrepresented minorities," reports Peter Bacchetti, PhD, adjunct professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at UCSF. "He has also identified and addressed other key problems, such as misconceptions about Proposition 209, the need for good data on the diversity of candidate pools, and the absence of incentives and accountability that would encourage use of the Ambassador program by search chairs. A recent survey evaluating the program solicited suggestions for improvement. Nearly all of these were ideas that Dr. Brody had already raised and begun addressing - a testament to this enthusiastic commitment to being proactive, innovative and comprehensive in improving diversity at UCSF."
Brody also was instrumental in establishing the School of Dentistry's model postbaccalaureate program, which assists disadvantaged students to enter the health professions. He worked closely with Charles Alexander, associate dean for student affairs in the dental school, to design the program and then ran it for five years. In fact, the program in the School of Medicine followed its lead in terms of curriculum and design. The postbaccalaureate program has been quite successful in helping students enter dentistry: All 60 of his students entered dental school, and now many are practicing in underserved communities.
Brody has also worked in middle schools, high schools and at the college level to promote health profession careers to minorities. When he first started at UCSF, he focused on recruiting minority students for dentistry. One of those students, Nelson Artiga, is currently the assistant dean for Community Clinics. In addition, Brody has worked with minority faculty to assist them in advancing their careers.
He also works with the Omega Boys and Girls Club, an organization devoted to helping direct young people at risk into a more positive path. The students with whom Brody works are either incarcerated or on probation. Brody spends time with the young boys while they are in jail and after they are released into the community. The goals are first to keep them alive and free and then encourage them to pursue education and a career. In cooperation with the UCSF Human Resources department, Brody has been able to secure employment at UCSF for many young minority individuals. For his efforts, Brody has been honored twice by Omega, once as Man of the Year in 2000 and then as a recipient of its Lifetime Coaching Award in 2005.
Martha Hooven
For more than 25 years, Hooven has been a forceful advocate for affirmative action and promoting diversity, according to her nominators.
"On a departmental basis, Ms. Hooven constantly seeks out ways to hold onto the Department of Medicine's diverse talent and to increase that diversity. Recognition of employee achievements and celebrating the department's rich mix of employees from all walks of life are two ways she successfully achieves this goal," writes Lee Goldman, chair of the Department of Medicine and a nominator.
At the campus level, Hooven has served two consecutive terms as co-chair of the Chancellor's Advisory Committee on Diversity. Due to her commitment to diversity, the Department of Medicine has been a recipient of the UCSF Diversity and Affirmative Action Best Practices Award four years in a row. She has shown her commitment by identifying parity goals, raising the awareness of these goals at a divisional level, and constantly exploring new ways to attract a diverse pool of applicants, according to Goldman.
In 1988, Hooven helped establish the Academic Business Officers Group (ABOG) Mentorship Program, which has flourished ever since it became official in 1990. The mentorship program is credited with helping UCSF retain and empower the leaders of tomorrow while at the same time advancing affirmative action goals for diversity at the managerial level.
"She has created a culture in the department that celebrates diversity on every level from recruitment practices to social functions," says Talmadge King, Constance B. Wofsy Distinguished Professor and vice chair of the Department of Medicine.
Adds Wanda M. Ellison-Crockett, chief administrative officer in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, "Martha has been with the University since 1980, and has moved into positions where her dynamic leadership and expertise have been most beneficial to the institution. She has been a longstanding advocate and champion of inclusion and broad representation of people of color and/or sexual orientation in positions of power and influence through the organization."
Damon Francis
Francis is lauded by his nominators for exhibiting outstanding leadership in promoting diversity on campus, broadening opportunities for disadvantaged youths in the Bay Area, and promoting health care to the underserved, both in the Bay Area and abroad.
"Community service and outreach have been a strong focus for Mr. Francis throughout medical school," says Maxine Papadakis, MD, associate dean for student affairs and a nominator.
During his first and second years at UCSF, he participated in the student-run UCSF Homeless Clinic's Smoking Cessation Program, where he worked two nights per week as a group leader, monitoring nicotine replacement and buproprion therapy, and providing cognitive behavioral therapy to participants at the Next Door clinic. He also participated in Health Hut, a neighborhood health fair providing health education and health screenings to underserved children. He also was treasurer for the campus chapter of the Student National Medical Association, and coordinated Afro-Fusion, a show presented to the UCSF community, featuring pan-African cultural performances and promoting understanding of and appreciation for the cultural and ethnic diversity within the campus community, according to Papadakis.
Francis co-founded MedLink, an academic enrichment and mentorship program serving local low-income high school students interested in careers in health care. This ongoing outreach and mentoring program promotes the advancement of disadvantaged youths and encourages them to pursue higher education and health professions careers.
"He is working closely with the medical student organizers to assist in developing closer partnerships with a few high schools in San Francisco to assist in student recruitment and to engage the staff of those schools in MedLink," says Sharad Jain, MD, associate professor of clinical medicine at UCSF and faculty adviser to MedLink. "In addition, Damon plans to develop better evaluation tools to assess the overall impact of MedLink and to work with the medical students to foster more sustained mentoring relationships with their high school mentees. He is a student who practices what he preaches, and has taken a leadership role in attempting to understand and address some of the inequalities in our society."
Kate Lupton, MD, who entered medical school with Francis in fall 2001, also voiced support for Francis. "Damon is an incredibly dedicated, devoted advocate for underserved and underrepresented people. Of my medical school peers, he most readily comes to mind when I imagine a future physician who combines passion for social justice, commitment to the critical causes of equality and equal opportunity, and humor and grace under the toughest of circumstances."
A 2000 graduate of UC Berkeley, Francis earned a bachelor's degree in integrative biology with highest distinction in general scholarship and induction into the Phi Beta Kappa Society. Throughout college, he annually received a Louise Patterson award for outstanding African American students. While in college, Francis worked as a student trainer for UC Berkeley's intercollegiate athletics teams and mentored at-risk youths through the Berkeley Youth Alternatives after-school program by tutoring in a variety of subjects, organizing recreational activities and serving as a positive role model.
Executive Vice Chancellor Eugene Washington with awardees. Photo by Abeba Wuhib
Source: Lisa Cisneros
