1982
Gangarosa's challenge
After two retirements, Eugene
Gangarosa comes to direct Emory's
public health program. Within the
first year of his leadership
enrollment triples.

by Rhonda Mullen

om Sellers, professor emeritus, is standing outside on a gray day, arms crossed, his head craned back to get a look at the towering Grace Crum Rollins Public Health Building. Thinking back more than 25 years ago, Sellers remembers the early days of the public health program at Emory. "It was just a sapling then," he says. "If just the right person hadn't come along at just the right time to lead it, it would have blown over." He tilts his head further to see the top floors of the building, and adds, "It could have been lost -- many times."

In 1982, "just the right person" for the job was Eugene Gangarosa, a veteran of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Gangarosa had recently returned to the United States from Lebanon, where he had successfully served as public health d ean of the American University of Beirut during the civil war.

His challenge was to prove that the graduate program in public health was a viable addition to the medical school and the university. To achieve this, he had to attract more students and, most essentially, address the ever-expanding financial deficit. He knew what had to be done. He knew it wouldn't be easy. But he also believed it could be done and the effort was worth it.

Richard Levinson was a faculty member when Gangarosa became director. In their years of working closely together, Levinson heard again and again the director's belief that the public health program at Emory would evolve into a competitive school with its own building. "I'm not by nature an optimist," Levinson says. "I thought he was dangerously hallucinatory. It turns out he was visionary."

1983
Changing degrees
The Emory public health degree
changes its degree title from a
Masters of Community Health to
a Masters of Public Health (MPH).

1984
Technology surge
Arranged by a grant from then-CDC
Director William Foege, the MPH
program gets its first computer.

1985
International roots
Joan Herold, a reproductive health
and population studies researcher,
joins the faculty in international
health.

"During my first career at CDC, I had many colleagues and friends," Gangarosa says. "I had amassed brownie points and some promissory notes." He started calling in favors, asking CDC friends to teach as adjunct professors in Emory's program.

When Gangarosa took the director's job in 1982, the community health program offered 12 courses. To get the extra necessary credits for a master's degree, students attended neighboring institutions, and as consequence, Emory had to share its tuition re venue. This arrangement further aggravated the program's fiscal deficit. However, by the end of Gangarosa's first year, with the voluntary assistance of many former CDC colleagues, the program was able to increase its course offerings to 55 on the Emory c ampus. Gangarosa himself coordinated three courses: Perspectives in Public Health, Environmental Health, and Environmental Microbiology, as well as co-taught a course on the epidemiology of infectious diseases.

Also, the program was attracting its own part-time and full-time faculty. Roger Rochat followed by Mike Lane, both on assignment from CDC, established the international health track, with Joan Herold, an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer at CDC and a reproductive health and population studies specialist, assisting in the effort. Clark Heath and John Richardson, also on assignment from CDC, established the environmental and occupational health track. Kathy Miner, an alumna who was working for the st ate of Georgia in health education, returned to the program to create a health education track. Nancy Thompson, another alumna, joined John Boring to form an epidemiology section.

The enrollment curve took a leap during Gangarosa's first year as well, going from 16 part-time students to approximately 40 students, who included the first international students. Whereas previously the program emphasized recruiting only students who had public health experience, it began to recruit anyone who had a serious interest in pursuing public health, despite a lack of previous professional work in the field.

Another major change was a new name for the degree. "In 1976, a Masters of Community Health made sense," Gangarosa says, "particularly with the program's community focus." However, many of the early graduates found themselves having to explain the les ser known degree to potential employers, who sometimes confused its initials with maternal and child health. In 1983, Emory officially changed its MCH degree to a Masters of Public Health (MPH).

The change represented more than a new name. It also signaled a shift from a community-based program to one that reached out to the world. Gangarosa felt his own career had greatly benefitted from overseas practical experience, and he helped build simi lar opportunities for fieldwork for Emory students. "You can't teach public health entirely in the classroom," he says.

1985
An accredited sapling
The overwhelming endorsement of the
second accrediting team gave outside
credibility to the program. The late
Genie DeHaan, a 1977 graduate of
the program, writes the second
accreditation report.

1987
Reaching the top branches
Emory MPH students who are also
pursuing medical degrees take the
specialty board in preventive medicine,
scoring first in the nation.

Fred Kennedy, a long-time faculty member who remains in a key position at the school today, remembers those lean and restrictive years. "I have an image of Gene walking back from a budget meeting up Clifton Road," he says, "and he looked like he had ju st been pounded in the ground. We were existing just hand-to-mouth, and I wondered, 'How will we get through this?'"

Levinson has a similar memory. "What Gene put together was part smoke and mirrors. It looked like we had an army of people, but we were building a lot out of begged, borrowed, and stolen components. We were able to make a lot out of a little."

At one point, Gangarosa even tendered his resignation, but Tom Sellers talked him into staying. "He said, 'Gene, stick with it.' He was in the right place at the right time, and he had strength in his convictions," Gangarosa says of Sellers. "He was th e peacemaker with uncertain faculty and with the School of Medicine."

External recognition for the MPH program also helped. In 1985, for example, the accreditation team who reviewed the program was enthusiastic about the progress the program had made, and they granted the accreditation without hesitation. For another exa mple, just two years later, when MPH graduates received the results of their specialty boards in preventive medicine, they were ranked first in the nation. "Although they were a small group," Gangarosa says, "they helped us demonstrate our academic potent ial. It was something to show the dean."

The MPH program was amassing other external supporters. One day, then-CDC director Bill Foege came with his colleague Jeff Koplan (who is the current CDC director) to Gangarosa's offices at 1518 Clifton Road. Foege wanted to know how he could help. The encouragement was important, and the help that followed made the difference. This help came in the form of CDC-assigned faculty, numerous adjunct faculty, and the program's first contract to develop an international health track. "That was one of the bes t investments of public money ever," Gangarosa says.

Foege was to play a larger role in the program's evolution to a school. He had close ties to Emory University President James T. Laney, and his became one more active voice of support when it came time for the program's next step.

May 1988
Transplantation
With growth of the student body and
faculty, the MPH program moves to one
floor of the newly constructed
American Cancer Society headquarters.

1988-1989
Growing an identity
The MPH program becomes a division
within the Emory School of Medicine.
Charles Hatcher believes that the
program should be elevated to
school status.

Commencement 1990
New shoots
The program's graduates climb to
more than 300 alums.

In 1989, the program was elevated to division status within the medical school. When D. A. Henderson from the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health was hired as a consultant, the division got another vote of confidence. Henderson's report r ecommended the program was strong enough to support school status without further years of development. A working committee of Tom Sellers, Gene Gangarosa, Mike Kutner, and Ray Greenberg began meeting to discuss the possibilities.

They had the strong support of Charles Hatcher, the vice president for health affairs and director of the Woodruff Health Sciences Center, who believed that Emory should have a school of public health. "My instincts told me that a cardiothoracic surgeo n was unlikely to have a lot of interest in public health," Greenberg says. "Fortunately for the school, Dr. Hatcher did not fit the conventional stereotype -- he saw the school as one of the important disciplines in the health sciences."

Other Emory administrators were key to the founding of the school. Greenberg felt Laney's support early on when the proposed school framed its mission as serving the cause of social justice. Then-provost Billy Frye was another consistent advocate, havi ng served at the University of Michigan, where he saw the value of a strong school of public health.

One of the strongest assets in building the school, Greenberg says, was the supportive relationship with School of Medicine Dean Jeffrey L. Houpt, who became dean in 1989. "Jeff allowed programs, including some large research efforts, to be relocated f rom the School of Medicine to the new school," Greenberg says. "He also provided financial assistance, which was critical in the early days. Although one can argue that the School of Medicine benefitted from the emergence of a strong partner in the School of Public Health, I think that Jeff lent this support simply because he thought that it was the right thing to do."

On September 13, 1990, the Board of Trustees of Emory University granted school status to the Division of Public Health. Greenberg was named dean. Because of his age of 35, many called him "the boy dean." But he was the right person for the job, Gangarosa says. "He cemented the synergy between the medical school and public health. He brought money and resources to the new school. He was tactful and skillful with wonderful outreach skills. Right before my eyes, I was seeing all that I had dreamed of was coming true."

Fred Kennedy remembers the day after the trustees announced "we were a school. I made some signs that read 'School of Public Health' and mounted them at the elevator. It was a clear indication: We were now something different from what we were yesterda y."