2016 ACE Election Results

 

ACE President-Elect

 

Pauline Mendola, PhD, FACE is an Investigator in the Epidemiology Branch, Division of Intramural Population Health Research at the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. She is a Fellow of the College and was elected to the Board of Directors (2010-13). She won the ACE Student Prize Paper Award in 1994 and has been active in the College ever since. She served on the Communications and Public Relations Committee (1995-98), Membership Committee (2000-04; chair 2002-3), Mentoring Committee (2006-2009), Scientific Program Host Committee (2013-14) where she organized the first Poster Tour and an invited plenary session, and currently serves on the Awards Committee (2014-17). Dr. Mendola also received a special mentoring award from ACE in 2006 after her students won the ACE Student Prize two years in a row (Kwok, 2004; Gilboa, 2005).

Dr. Mendola earned a PhD in Epidemiology and Community Health from the University at Buffalo. She has held academic appointments at the University at Buffalo, and has adjunct faculty appointments at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Maryland. Her research focuses on environmental factors that impact reproductive health, particularly pregnancy outcomes. Before joining the NIH Intramural Program, she was a health scientist and Branch Chief, US Environmental Protection Agency (1997-2007) and Chief of the Infant, Child and Women’s Health Statistics Branch at the National Center for Health Statistics (2007-2011).

Statement: With more than 20 years of involvement in the College, I have seen a lot of changes in the membership and focus of the College over time. The increase in diversity among our members and the whole-hearted inclusion of our Associate Members into leadership roles in the College have been significant success stories. Also notable is the continued, active participation of epidemiologists from industry, government and academia. The ACE has always been the epidemiologist’s home for leadership regarding professional practice, educational competencies, training, and policy development. The educational opportunities we offer are stellar and our awards are among the most prestigious in the field. Yet with all the amazing and important work we do, our membership is declining. A recent survey, conducted by the Membership and Career Mentoring Committees, will help us identify the features of the College that are most important to our current members and suggest strategies to strengthen our outreach and build our membership base. We need to do everything we can to encourage Associate Members to transition to active Members and to promote our Members to Fellows as their careers progress. I think we can build on our successes, reach out to practicing epidemiologists in multiple venues and actively pursue strategies to increase our meeting attendance and strengthen our membership.

It is truly an honor to be nominated. If elected I will use my experience working within ACE and with other scientific organizations to raise awareness of the College, advance our mission and enhance the significant role ACE plays in furthering the contemporary practice and future of epidemiology.

 

Board of Directors Elected Fellows

 

Michael B. Cook, PhD, FACE, is a Tenure-track Investigator of epidemiology in the Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute.

Dr. Cook earned his BSc in Genetics at the University of Nottingham, England, and, subsequently, a PhD in Epidemiology at the University of Leeds, England. Dr. Cook joined the Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute as a Postdoctoral Fellow in 2007 before becoming a Research Fellow in 2008. He was promoted to the position of Tenure-track Investigator in 2011. Dr. Cook’s research interests include the epidemiology of esophageal adenocarcinoma—specifically, sex differences and the effects of obesity in the natural history of this disease—as well as the etiology and prognostic biomarkers of prostate cancer.

Statement: Since moving to the US in 2007, I have been a member of the College and I have recently sought and attained promotion to Fellow. During that time, I have served six years on the Publications Committee, the last three of which I have served as Chair. This service to the College has coincided with the development of the Strategic Plan which we have enacted at the committee level. The Strategic Plan has guided a fresh perspective of our activities and workstreams, leading to enhanced and reinvigorated approaches. Specifically, as Chair of the Publications Committee, I have overseen and contributed significantly to: 1) enriched strategies for identifying solicitations from the College for publication in our official journal, Annals of Epidemiology; 2) developed a plan to reinvigorate and expand the scope of the From the College section of the journal; 3) enhanced cross-committee communication with the Publications Committee and Annals of Epidemiology; 4) initiated workstream SOPs and focused on succession planning for the long-term success of the committee and the College. This experience has provided me with diverse perspectives of the College as well as a working knowledge of current and ongoing activities that are crucial to our mission. I now wish to apply this experience to serve at the Board level. I believe we need to further illuminate the distinct mission of the College in the discipline of epidemiology to help attract and retain a diverse membership. I am an advocate of methodologically rigorous science that has the ability to improve public health and reduce health disparities. These principles will be central in my service should I be elected to the Board.

Michele R. Forman, Ph.D., is the David Bruton Centennial Professor of Nutritional Science and The Population Research Center of The University of Texas at Austin. She holds a MSPH and Ph.D. in Epidemiology and a MA in Nutritional Anthropology, all from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

She began a four decade-long research career examining maternal and child health with a special focus on pregnancy outcomes in disadvantaged populations and conducts field epidemiology research across the globe. Her emphasis is on early life exposures and chronic disease risk as well as the role of nutrition in growth and health across the life course. As her research foci shifted from low birth-weight to chronic disease, the stillpoint of her compass remained fixed; she examines the developmental origins of disease. Her career spanned affiliations with the federal government – the CDC and Intramural Programs of NICHD and NCI; as well as academic appointments at the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health and at the UT MD Anderson Cancer Center. She has been on a number of editorial boards (e.g. Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers and Prevention and American Journal of Clinical Nutrition) and advisory boards (e.g. Board of the Gillings School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina; Sister Study-NIEHS; Legacy Study-Columbia School of Public Health). She chaired the Interagency Breast Cancer and The Environment Coordinating Committee, for the Secretary, DHHS, and the Directors of NIH, NCI and NIEHS in response to Congressional Legislation.

Statement: As an ACE member for decades, I am honored to be nominated for the ACE Board of Directors. As a member of the Policy Committee for the past two years, I spearheaded a new entity--the Policy Briefs page in the Annals due to an increasing awareness through the internet and other informational genre about controversial health issues that require rapid communication with clear articulation and a forum to reach consensus in a timely manner. For example: The advent of the Zika virus has implications for family planning policies that should include input from maternal and child health and infectious disease epidemiologists; but where do we discuss policy issues? Other examples include: refugee health in the U.S.; the basis for school schedules in light of sleep and physical activity effects on school performance and health in children; and the role of food insecurity in health and development. With the policy brief, one can envision the development of steps that lead to policy or overt actions that formulate policy. Further the policy brief will generate more visibility for the Annals by virtue of the novelty, the stage to articulate feedback in order to address policy issues and draw more readers/members to the ACE. If elected to the Board, my action-oriented approach would focus on: increasing membership in the ACE through mechanisms like the policy briefs; generating greater synergy between scientists who work in animal models and epidemiologists to accelerate research; and enhancing mentorship through ACE for alternate career models in the age of increasing challenges to funding research.

Maurizio Macaluso, PhD, is Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Cincinnati (UC) College of Medicine, Director of the Division of Biostatistics and Epidemiology of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, and Director of the Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Research Design (BERD) Core of the UC Center for Clinical and Translational Science and Training (CCTST).

He has an M.D. degree (1979) and diploma in Hygiene and Preventive Medicine (1982) from the University of Palermo, Italy, and a Doctor of Public Health degree in Epidemiology (1991) from the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). Before joining Cincinnati Children’s, he held positions at the National Tumor Institute in Milan (1980-1986), at the UAB School of Public Health (1986-2000), and at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, GA (2000-2011), where he served as Chief of the Women’s Health and Fertility Branch. Maurizio has 35 years of experience in epidemiologic research, covering methods, cancer epidemiology, occupational epidemiology, sexual and reproductive health, efficacy and safety of technologies that affect human fertility, child health and surveillance systems, and has published over 200 papers. He has led numerous research projects sponsored by the federal government and nongovernmental organizations, has extensive teaching experience and has mentored graduate students, post-doctoral fellows and junior faculty. He is a Fellow of the American College of Epidemiology (ACE) since 1997, has served on the ACE Publications Committee, on the ACE Annual Meeting Program Committee, and is Associate Editor of the Annals of Epidemiology.

Statement: I would be honored to serve on the ACE Board of Directors. I was inducted as a Fellow nearly 20 years ago, and ACE has been the most consistent home for my professional identity. I have pursued with passion the rigorous application of the scientific method in epidemiologic studies and clinical trials in multiple subject-matter areas. The interdisciplinary nature of my work has provided me with stimulating methodologic challenges and a broad perspective on the impact that epidemiology can have on human health. During the past five years I have led the largest biostatistics and epidemiology unit devoted to pediatric research in the USA, and the BERD unit of the UC CCTST. This experience has reinforced my appreciation for the core principles that distinguish epidemiology, and consolidated my view of the leadership role that epidemiologists should have in modern team science. The advent of “data sciences” requires that we make a conscientious effort to understand the nature of the problems arising from “big data,” work with biostatisticians and bioinformaticians, and develop a shared language. The new generation of epidemiologists will face novel, fascinating levels of complexity in the organization of the scientific research team, of the research hypotheses they will have to entertain, and of the data they will have to analyze. As I consider serving on the ACE Board of Directors, I feel both a sense of great responsibility and sincere passion because I would love to see ACE continue to be for new epidemiologists the professional home it has been for me.

 

Board of Director Elected Member 

 

Melinda C. Aldrich, MPH, PhD is an Assistant Professor at Vanderbilt University Medical Center where she conducts cancer and genetic epidemiology research.

Dr. Aldrich holds an MPH in Epidemiology/Biostatistics and PhD in Epidemiology from the University of California, Berkeley. She is currently faculty in the Department of Thoracic Surgery and Division of Epidemiology at Vanderbilt University. Dr. Aldrich has an established research program focused on identifying genetic and environmental risk factors for lung cancer, with an emphasis on understanding racial/ethnic differences in disease. Dr. Aldrich has been an active member with ACE for 10 years. Her service with ACE began when she was elected to be the second Associate Member to serve on the Board of Directors from 2006-2007. As an Associate Member, she took an active role in the Program Committee for the North American Congress of Epidemiology. Since then she has been involved with ACE on the Membership Committee (holding the positions of Secretary, Vice Chair, and Chair) and now serves on the ACE Policy Committee. Dr. Aldrich is also now serving as the ACE Representative on the Board of the International Joint Policy Committee of the Societies of Epidemiology (IJPC-SE). Dr. Aldrich’s experiences with the Policy Committee and the IJPC-SE allow her to advocate for enhancing the translation of epidemiology into policy.

Statement: My experience for the last decade with ACE has been immensely valuable, providing me with insight at multiple levels within the College. Having started with ACE as an Associate Member on the Board of Directors and then continuing as a Member on the Membership and Policy Committees has provided me with first-hand experience necessary for serving on the Board of Directors. My current position as Board Member on the International Joint Policy Committee gives me the global policy lens through which I will bring my experience and insight to the ACE Board of Directors. As a Board member, it will be my role to help promote the College and build our membership with unique perspectives and diversity. Only with a robust membership of diverse perspectives will we engage others and make advancements for our profession. I will also bring to the Board my policy perspective and experience that is deeply rooted within the College.