New 2016 ERHD Graduate – Melissa Harrell

No comments

During the end of this summer 2016, the ERHD program graduated another ERHD student. It gives me great pleasure to announce a brand new graduate of our ERHD program – Melissa Harrell. Melissa Harrell completed her final course in the our ERHD program – MPH 6009 – Capstone Experience in Ethnic Health & Health Disparities. In addition, Melissa’s Capstone project was entitled, “Project Upstream: Community Approaches to Addressing Toxic Stress in at Risk Children.” Her performance in all of the other 3 courses (MPH 6005, MPH 6007, and MPH 6008) were outstanding as well.

The ERHD program is very proud of her accomplishment and we know that Melissa Harrell will make a difference in her future career endeavors!

Here is a photo of Melissa Harrell.

Melissa Harrell - New ERHD Graduate
Melissa Harrell – New ERHD Graduate

ERHD Staff — Kelly Bass — Our Coordinator of Student Admissions and Coordinator of ERHD Courses

No comments

As Director of the ERHD program, we would not have been as successful as we have been during the past 6 years without the assistance of a very significant staff administrator. Although she works primarily for the MPH program and the Department of Public Health, Kelly Bass has been our ERHD Coordinator of Student Admissions and Coordinator of ERHD Courses from the very beginning.

Selfie with Kelly

The ERHD program has relied upon her assistance, expertise and extra time to help me with all the students from various departments at ECU who have wanted to take our ERHD courses and potentially enroll into the ERHD program.

So I would be remised if I did not acknowledge the contributions of our outstanding and OFFICIALLY designated ERHD Coordinator of Student Admissions and Coordinator of ERHD Courses – Kelly Bass!

Here are a couple of photos of Kelly and I after I treated her for lunch.

Kelly Bass

ERHD Alumni Update – Shannon Spence – New Position

No comments

Here is some great news that I recently received from our 2015 ERHD graduate – Shannon Spence.

Shannon informed me that since receiving her ERHD certificate, she was offered and accepted a position with NC DHHS as a PCS Policy Analyst at the Division of Medical Assistance. Shannon started her new position on May 2nd. She also said the following:

“I think the hard work is paying off!”

As Director of the ERHD program, I am very delighted, overjoyed and PROUD to know that Shannon has TRULY benefited from taking the 4 courses and completing the ERHD certificate. That’s what I am talking about — the tangible, practical benefits of our ERHD courses, training and certificate. It leads to new opportunities!

Here is Shannon’s photo.

Spence, Shannon

ERHD Alumni – Daniel Allen – Receiving Medical Degree at 2016 ECU Graduation Ceremony

No comments

As Director of the ERHD Program and Professor of Public Health & Anthropology, I regularly participate in the Fall and Spring Graduation Ceremonies of East Carolina University. Although this spring ECU graduation ceremony began in the rain, the weather cleared up for another outstanding ceremony.

Surprisingly, at the graduation ceremony, I met one of our 2014 ERHD graduates — Daniel Allen. He was receiving his Medical Degree (M.D.) at this spring commencement and saw me taking pictures. He came over to me and I congratulated him on his MD degree and then asked to take a Selfie with him.

Amazingly, it was just a couple of years ago that Daniel completed all the ERHD courses in our program and now he is receiving his Medical Degree. I am sure all of our ERHD coursework and projects/proposals will make a significant impact on his career as a practicing physician.

Again, I am proud to play a part in the lives of another one of our OUTSTANDING ERHD GRADUATES!

Here is my Selfie with Daniel.
Here is my Selfie with Daniel.

ERHD Alumni – Update – Shanekia Blackshear Joyner

No comments

Here is my Selfie with Shanekia.
Here is my Selfie with Shanekia.

Here is Shanekia in her Army uniform.
Here is Shanekia in her Army uniform.

As Director of the ERHD program, it is always rewarding to find out about our ERHD graduates and what they are doing now. A couple of days ago, Shanekia Blackshear Joyner, an ERHD 2014 graduate came to ECU and my office for a visit. She shared with me her latest accomplishments and talked about her experience in her new career.

Shanekia Blackshear Joyner is now a Licensed Practical Nurse at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center – an Army Medical Center in Germany! Yes, I said Germany! She is in the military and an Army specialist who wants to make a difference in the field of nursing, health & medical care but in expanding our Westernized view of the world’s populations.

So please check out our ERHD Facebook page and give a LIKE to our ERHD Graduate who is making and will continue to make her mark in the world! Here are a couple of photos including a Selfie that I took during her visit to my office.

ERHD Alumni – Update – Jessica Miller

No comments

As Director of the ERHD program, it gives me great pleasure to find out about the achievements and new opportunities of our ERHD graduates. Last week, I found out that one of our 2015 graduates – Jessica Miller — became Director of the Allied Health Continuing Education a position within the Regional Education and Information Services Division of AHEC.

Jessica Miller - Our latest ERHD graduate
Jessica Miller – Our latest ERHD graduate

As Director, she will plan, implement, and evaluate allied health continuing education programs and assists with other educational activities as well. This position also requires the Director to create and maintain collaborative relationships with nursing and allied health professionals, utilization of resources within and/or outside of the Southern Regional AHEC service area as well as utilization of resources with the Academic Partners, Duke University and the UNC-CH facilities. Additional duties include the coordination of special AHEC projects designed to increase the retention, recruitment of health professionals in the region and designed to increase the number of new allied health clinical sites and educational outreach programs in the region as opportunities arise.

Wow!! This is a great achievement by Jessica and the ERHD program applauds her accomplishment and delighted that our ERHD program provided her with some additional skills and expertise that should help her on her new Director position!

Accepting Applications for Fall 2016 Admissions

As Director of the ERHD program, I am pleased to announce that our program is accepting applications from qualified graduate professionals for the Fall 2016 Admissions. The ERHD graduate certificate online program is STILL the one and only graduate certificate program in the United States focused specifically on ethnic and rural health disparities. The ERHD graduate certificate online program uses the latest online technology to train public health and medical health professionals in not only obtaining additional expertise in ethnic and rural health disparities but also in developing culturally competent solutions for specific health disparity populations. For a complete overview and introduction to our ERHD program, please go to our website at:

Ethnic and Rural Health Graduate Certificate Online Program

The three major objectives of the ERHD certificate program are to get graduates to:
1. Identify ethnic and rural health disparity issues;
2. Analyze more comprehensively ethnic and rural health disparity issues; and
3. Develop more culturally competent projects, plans and policies that are designed for specific ethnic and rural communities in the United States and communities around the world.

To obtain a graduate certificate in ethnic and rural health disparities, completion of 12 credit hours is required. The ERHD program consists of four online courses:

1. MPH 6005 African American Health – Summer 1 semester
2. MPH 6007 Global Public Health – Fall semester
3. MPH 6008 Ethnic Health & Health Disparities – Spring semester
4. MPH 6009 Capstone Experience in Ethnic Health & Health Disparities – Summer 11 week semester

Applicants applying to the ERHD program need to submit to our ERHD Admissions Committee the following:

ECU MPH Students ONLY
Letter of Interest
Writing Sample
Recommendation Letter

Other Graduate Students
Letter of Interest
Writing Sample
Recommendation Letter
Transcript
GRE or MCAT Score

Send all materials to:

Director Eric Bailey
ERHD Admissions Committee
Ethnic and Rural Health Disparities (ERHD) Program
East Carolina University
209 Flanagan
Mail Stop 568
Greenville, NC 27834

Due date for application materials is March 31st, 2016

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to email me: baileye@ecu.edu

We are looking forward to a new set of ERHD graduate professionals beginning the Fall 2016!

ERHD Program – Published in Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities

No comments

The Ethnic and Rural Health Disparities (ERHD) has truly come along way since our start just a few years in 2010. With the support of the Department of Public Health at ECU and particularly the previous chairperson – Dr. Lloyd Novick — the ERHD program became established within the system of ECU as one of the unique online programs in the country. Once we began to enroll students in 2010 and 2011, I had a good feeling that we were paving a new way to provide graduate health professionals a higher level of expertise training in public health and medicine that was focused on issues such as health disparities, rural health disparities, ethnic and racial health disparities, global public health, qualitative research, cultural competency and African American health.

With the success of graduating outstanding ERHD students for four solid years, by 2014 I decided that our ERHD program needed to evaluate itself in the manner of an ERHD Alumni Study. With the assistance of our graduate assistant at the time — Shanekia Joyner — Shanekia and I along with Dr. Justin Moore developed the research project and surveyed as many graduates that had the time to complete our online survey.

In March, I presented the results of our 2014 ERHD Alumni Survey study at the Association of Prevention Teaching Research (APTR) Conference in Charleston, SC.. That was a major success and I received invaluable feedback and support from all the professionals who attended the conference.

Now we are receiving additional professional acknowledgment of our program from the Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities. The journal has published our research study as of September 2015 with an online version and later in 2016 the print (hardcopy) version will be printed in this professional academic peer-reviewed journal.

Here is the article and it is entitled, “A New Online Strategy in Teaching Racial and Ethnic Health and Health Disparities to Public Health Professionals.” After review, let us know what you think about our ERHD program by emailing me at: baileye@ecu.edu. We feel very proud of our online ERHD Graduate Certificate program and all those who have assisted us in varying capacities to keep it going from semester to semester and year to year.

I want to sincerely thank all those who have believed in our online ERHD Certificate Program, supported our program in the past and who are continuing to support our ERHD program for the future. I especially feel pleased and grateful for all of our OUTSTANDING ERHD GRADUATES!! Each one of you are THE NEW LEADERS in the field of PUBLIC HEALTH AND MEDICINE!!

Shannon Spence – Our Latest ERHD Graduate from Summer 2015!

No comments

Shannon Spence
Shannon Spence

As Director of the ERHD program, it gives me great pleasure again to announce our latest ERHD graduate from the summer – Shannon Spence. Shannon completed her final course (MPH 6009) Capstone Experience in Ethnic Health & Health Disparities this summer. The title of her Capstone Proposal was, “A Proposed Investigation of Physical Activity in African American Faith Based Organizations.”

Shannon’s Capstone Proposal was innovative, informative and professionally-presented. Specifically, the introduction and background research on health disparities among African Americans and physical activity were very insightful. Most importantly, the development of a culturally competent physical activity program that is faith based for African Americans tends to be more effective than standardized physical activity program for African Americans. Finally, Shannon’s Capstone proposal is another example of the outstanding Capstone projects from our ERHD graduates!

So please share this information with your colleagues and send me an email if you want to know about our ERHD program and about our most recent ERHD graduate – Shannon Spence.

Accepting Applications for Spring 2016 Admissions

No comments

As Director of the ERHD Program, I am delighted to announce that our program is accepting applications from qualified graduate professionals for the Spring 2016 Admissions. The ERHD graduate certificate online program in ethnic and rural health disparities at East Carolina University uses the latest online technology to assist medical health professionals and public health administrators in not only obtaining additional expertise in ethnic and rural health disparities but also in developing culturally competent solutions for specific health disparity populations.

The three major objectives for the certificate program are to get graduates to:
1. Identify ethnic and rural health disparity issues;
2. Analyze more comprehensively ethnic and rural health issues; and
3. Develop more culturally competent projects, plans and policies that are designed for specific ethnic and rural communities in the United States and communities around the world.

To obtain a graduate certificate in ethnic and rural health disparities, completion of 12 credit hours is required. The ERHD program consists of four online courses:

1. MPH 6005 African American Health
2. MPH 6007 Global Public Health
3. MPH 6008 Ethnic Health & Health Disparities
4. MPH 6009 Capstone Experience in Ethnic Health & Health Disparities

Applicants applying to the ERHD program need to submit to our ERHD Admissions Committee the following:

ECU MPH Students ONLY
Letter of Interest
Writing Sample
Recommendation Letter

Other Graduate Students
Letter of Interest
Writing Sample
Recommendation Letter
Transcript
GRE or MCAT Score

Send all materials to:

Director Eric Bailey
ERHD Admissions Committee
Ethnic and Rural Health Disparities (ERHD) Program
East Carolina University
209 Flanagan
Mail Stop 568
Greenville, NC 27834

Due date for application materials is October 30, 2015.

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to email: baileye@ecu.edu

We are looking forward to a new set of ERHD graduate professionals in 2016!