Accolades

Christel N. Temple, professor of Africana Studies, has been named editor-in-chief of the Journal of Black Studies, effective in January 2023. The 53-year-old publication is considered one of the most important journals in the field of Afrocentric scholarship. 

In addition to her work with Africana Studies, a department she once chaired, Temple also is an affiliate of the Graduate Program for Cultural Studies and the Critical European Culture Studies doctoral program. Her research focuses on Africana cultural memory studies, comparative Africana literature, Black nationalism, pan-Africanism and Afro-European Studies.

She is the author of “Black Cultural Mythology,” “Muhammad Ali in Africana Cultural Memory” and other texts.

Kate Ledger (EDUC ’06G) , acting vice chancellor for Communications and Marketing, was named the American Marketing Association Foundation’s Higher Education Marketer of the Year.

The AMA seeks to elevate marketing visionaries, empower future generations, inspire a more diverse industry and ensure marketing research impacts the public good. 

Ledger, selected by a committee of marketing experts and practitioners, was recognized for showing “extraordinary leadership and achievement in the field of higher education marketing.”

“I’m passionate about the University’s brand because of its impact on our reputation and the enthusiasm of the Pitt community. I’m honored to receive this recognition for marketing work that I love to do, especially with the great team at the University,” said Ledger.

During her tenure at Pitt, she’s held five unique marketing roles across the University, progressively increasing the size and scope of her teams.

Ledger formerly served as the marketing and communications leader in the Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business, the College of Business Administration, the Office of the Provost and the Swanson School of Engineering. 

As executive director of marketing and engagement in the Office of Admissions and Financial Aid, Ledger led the marketing and on-campus visit teams, helping to increase the quality of Pitt’s incoming class and exceeding enrollment goals each year. Among many creative projects, she helped the team implement Salesforce, automate more than 800 segmented emails and rebrand the campus visit program. 

Ledger launched the University’s first master brand in 2019 and, as assistant vice chancellor for marketing, the first University-wide brand campaign in 2022 while concurrently leading Pitt’s COVID-19 communications strategy.

Two Pitt scientists received 2022 Outstanding Achievement Prizes in Mental Health awards from the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation, the world’s largest private funder of mental health research. 

In recognition of his extraordinary work in developing trans-neuronal tracers able to reveal the brain’s complex wiring, the foundation awarded the Goldman-Rakic Prize for Outstanding Achievement in Cognitive Neuroscience to Peter Strick, who is the Thomas Detre Professor and chair of neurobiology in Pitt’s School of Medicine. 

“This award is very special to me,” said Strick, who also serves as scientific director of Pitt’s Brain Institute. “Patricia Goldman-Rakic was an exceptional neuroscientist who made landmark contributions to our knowledge of frontal lobe structure and function. She also was a wonderful friend, and I am deeply honored to be chosen for a prize that bears her name.” 

Honoring his contributions to research on bipolar spectrum disorders in adolescents, Boris Birmaher, distinguished professor of psychiatry and endowed chair in early onset bipolar disease, was awarded the Ruane Prize for Outstanding Achievement in Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Research.

“I am so grateful for this recognition. I have been fortunate to work with many people who are dedicated to the assessment, treatment and research of youth living with diverse psychiatric disorders,” said Birmaher. “The field of pediatric mood and anxiety disorders continues to advance, and we expect that many of those advances will help improve the lives of patients and their families, something I am deeply passionate about.”

Strick and Birmaher presented their work at the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation 2022 International Mental Health Research Symposium on Oct. 28 in New York City.

— Anita Srikameswaran and Ana Gorelova

Peter Wipf, professor in the Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences, received the 2023 Award for Creative Work in Synthetic Organic Chemistry from the American Chemical Society. 

A prolific organic chemist, Wipf has been a faculty member in Pitt’s Department of Chemistry since 1990, focusing on organic compounds — how to synthesize them and how they work — including those with potential uses in medicine. His research has been cited more than 37,000 times.

Wipf is a fellow of the American Chemical Society as well as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He’ll be honored at the American Chemical Society’s spring meeting in Indianapolis, Indiana, on March 28, 2023.

Vittorio Paolone, professor of physics and astronomy, was awarded an American Physical Society Fellowship. The honor has gone to 45 Pitt faculty members since 1930, including Singh in 2011 and, most recently, John Swanson Endowed Professor Scott Mao in the Swanson School of Engineering in 2020. Earlier this year, Paolone received the 2022 W.K.H. Panofsky Prize in Experimental Particle Physics from the APS.  

“It’s humbling to have your colleagues in the field consider your work significant,” Paolone said. “It’s a prestigious recognition by my peers since the number of recommended nominees in each year does not exceed one-half percent of the then-current membership of the society.”

10/11/22 correction: This story was updated to reflect Kingsley's role on the National Board of Directors.

Laura Kingsley, director of the Office of Sponsored Programs at the University of Pittsburgh, was re-elected to serve on the the National Board of Directors of the National Council of University Research Administrators.

Kingsley represents Region II, which includes Delaware, the District of Columbia, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. 

“In this next term, I plan to continue to advocate for Region II research administrators, build stronger relationships within the regional and national networks and continue to promote an inclusive environment where all feel welcomed, heard and valued,” wrote Kingsley in a statement of interest she provided to her colleagues.

Kingsley also serves on council's Board of Directors Remote Work Survey Task Force, examining the impact of remote work arrangements on research administration.

The organization, formed in 1959, promotes the field of research administration by building communication and consensus nationally and abroad. It has over 7,500 members from more than 1,100 higher education institutions in 40 countries.

Although her father, Paul C. Duke III, died when she was a little girl, Sarah Duke knows she takes after him in many ways.

She loves animals the way he did and owns four “bully breed” dogs. And she loves cars the way he did, too. And she loves to share what has been given to her.   

As a girl, she collected funds for animals at the McKean County SPCA, and as she grew older, she quietly helped classmates at Bradford Area High School who could not afford to purchase yearbooks. She purchased a bench in memory of 2019 BAHS grad Peyton Kirk who had just finished his freshman year at the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford when he died in 2020.

Now she is following in her father’s footsteps by promoting technology education at Pitt-Bradford with a $40,000 gift toward the George B. Duke Engineering and Information Technologies Building named in honor of her uncle. Paul Duke worked with engineering at Zippo and was an early contributor to Pitt-Bradford’s technology endowment fund. In honor of that gift, Pitt-Bradford named its aquatic center in his honor, and young Sarah cut the ribbon.      

In recognition of the gift, the office of the engineering technology director will be named in her honor.

She is the latest generation of the Blaisdell-Duke family to take up a philanthropic tradition that has supported everyone from individuals to Bradford institutions such as Pitt-Bradford since its founding in 1963, and evidence of that can be seen in the names of the Miriam Barcroft Blaisdell Endowed Scholarships, Blaisdell Hall, Harriett B. Wick Chapel, Sarah B. Dorn Residence Hall as well as the aquatic center and new engineering building.   

Like her father, grandmother Sarah B. Duke and great-grandfather George G. Blaisdell, she believes in sharing what she has.   

The new Duke Building is making it possible for Pitt-Bradford to offer new majors in energy engineering technology and mechanical engineering technology as well as providing a new home for existing programs in energy science and technology, computer information systems and technology, and information systems.   

For more information about the building and programs, visit upb.pitt.edu/engineeringbuilding.

Two School of Public Health departments welcomed new leaders for the fall 2022 semester. 

Mary Hawk has been appointed chair of the Department of Behavioral and Community Health Sciences and Yan Ma will lead the Department of Biostatistics. Both positions were effective Sept. 1. 

“We are excited to welcome these leaders,” said Maureen Lichtveld, Pitt Public Health dean and Jonas Salk Professor of Population Health. “They bring extensive research and teaching experience, compelling visions and effective management skills to their new roles.”

Hawk is currently associate professor of behavioral and community health sciences and the department’s vice chair for research.

“Our students, staff and faculty do amazing work and are clearly committed to our department’s vision,” said Hawk, who completed her DrPH and MPH at Pitt. “I look forward to advancing collaborative leadership in the department and across the health sciences.”

Among her research interests are the assessment and implementation of interventions to improve health outcomes for underserved populations, including those with substance use issues; enhancing the delivery of needed services; and developing community-engaged approaches to promote public health. She is principal investigator of a National Institute on Drug Abuse-funded investigation to explore stigma and health outcomes for people living with HIV.

Hawk cofounded The Open Door Inc., a harm reduction housing program to improve health outcomes for chronically homeless people living with HIV, and is actively engaged with community organizations locally, nationally and globally. Her contributions to research and education have been honored with many awards, including the school’s James L. Craig Excellence in Education Award. 

Ma comes to Pitt Public Health from the Milken Institute School of Public Health at George Washington University, where he served as professor and vice chair of the Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics. Ma is also founding director of its PhD program in Health and Biomedical Data Science and director of Biostatistics and Epidemiology Consulting Services.

“It’s a tremendous honor to be selected to lead this elite department of biostatistics,” said Ma, adding that Pitt health sciences also has an international reputation for excellence in research and education. “I look forward to working with the outstanding faculty, staff and students in years to come.”

Ma’s theoretical and computational statistical research interests include missing data imputation, machine learning, meta-analysis, methods for assessing interrater reliability, causal inference, complex sample surveys and longitudinal methods. Ma has collaborated on investigations touching orthopedics, anesthesiology, health disparities, cancer, HIV/AIDS, psychiatry and emergency medicine.

Ma is currently principal investigator of a National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities-funded project developing data driven methods for missing data imputation in surgical outcome disparities. He is a recipient of the Young Investigator Award from the American Statistical Association’s Section on Statistics in Epidemiology and the Achievement in Academia Award from the American Public Health Association.

— Michele Baum

The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) has awarded Pitt Psychiatry a Center of Excellence (P50) grant renewal for Enhancing Triage and Utilization for Depression and Emergent Suicidality (ETUDES), led by David Brent, MD (Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry, Pediatrics, Epidemiology, and Clinical and Translational Science, and Endowed Chair in Suicide Studies). The Center is co-led by Bruce Rollman, MD, MPH, (University of Pittsburgh Professor and UPMC Endowed Chair in General Internal Medicine), and Jami Young, PhD (Professor and Associate Chair for Psychiatry Research at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia). Thirty additional investigators from Columbia University, Georgia Tech, Hunter College, the University of Oregon, and Kaiser Permanente, representing psychiatry, psychology, pediatrics, internal medicine, nursing, epidemiology, implementation science, statistics, bioinformatics, computer science, and economics also hold leadership positions in the Center.

The incidence of depression, suicidal behavior, and suicide among American youth has increased by more than 40% during the past decade, placing unprecedented demands on pediatric health care providers. To meet the challenge of what the US Surgeon General and the American Academy of Pediatrics have identified as a national emergency, the Center will enhance the ability of pediatric health care providers to assess, triage, and acutely manage suicidal youth who present in primary care. 
ETUDES will bring together the networks of two of the nation’s leading children’s hospitals, with three primary goals:

1.    Develop implementation-ready tools for pediatric health care providers that will reduce the rate of adolescent suicide and suicidal behavior;
2.    Augment the capacity of pediatric primary care for suicidal youth;
3.    Train a diverse national cohort of researchers with capacity to address the current mental health crisis among youth. 

Because rates of suicidal behavior have increased particularly sharply in adolescent youth of color, the Center will address racial and ethnic health disparities in adolescent suicidal behavior. To ensure that the Center’s assessments and interventions are acceptable and effective for individuals of color, Black and Hispanic youth and their families will comprise a substantial proportion of the 1,200 study participants. All of the tools and interventions tested in the Center will be developed collaboratively with adolescent patients, their families, pediatric and mental health clinicians, and community representatives, to ensure the products’ broad acceptability, feasibility, and effectiveness.

The following Pitt Psychiatry investigators have key roles in the Center:

Candice Biernesser, PhD, LCSW, MPH
David Brent, MD
César Escobar-Viera, MD, PhD
Tina Goldstein, PhD
David Kolko, PhD
Nadine Melhem, PhD
Neal Ryan, MD
Stephanie Stepp, PhD

For more information about the ETUDES Center, visit www.etudes.pitt.edu.