Translations: July 2009

July 1, 2009

As we begin summer, a substantial number of GUMC faculty members have maintained a heavy working schedule, especially those who have been serving on the implementation design teams for the Strategic Planning Initiative, and those who have submitted grant applications in response to the ARRA opportunity. I write to thank you for this extraordinary effort and extend my sincere confidence that this will yield a positive return for the medical center well into the future.

As I have mentioned on many occasions this year, we continue to do well compared to our peer institutions in spite of some very adverse economic conditions affecting academic medicine. We have made significant scientific and educational progress, and this continues to help us attract superior talent to our schools and research programs. The School of Medicine’s national rankings are up, and our sponsored research portfolio remains steady, which are significant achievements in these tough times, and stand as a testament to the productivity of our lean organization.

We continue to enhance the capability of our strongest programs. A stellar example is the breast cancer program. With the recruitment of V. Craig Jordan, OBE, PhD, DSc, as scientific director, Lombardi is without doubt the premiere center for breast cancer research and treatment in the country.

Strategically, we are on course. Recommendations from the implementation design teams are now being consolidated into a report to be shared with university leadership. In the meantime, I encourage the entire GUMC community to engage in the planning process by visiting the SPI website and by talking to colleagues who have served on the various strategy design and implementation teams.

Through periodic town hall meetings and faculty meetings, I will continue to reach out to all of you for your thoughts, concerns, and questions. A summary of the latest open forum with the PowerPoint presentation is available at this link.

Again, I wish to extend my warmest gratitude and appreciation for the outstanding efforts and accomplishments of the entire GUMC community.

As always, I welcome your questions and comments at gumcexecofc@georgetown.edu.

Howard J. Federoff, M.D., Ph.D.






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