Press Release

August 3, 2006
Contact: Anna Farneski
(973) 972-3000
farnesam@umdnj.edu

UMDNJ BOARD APPOINTS FACULTY MEMBERS
TO PRESIDENTIAL SEARCH COMMITTEE
Panel Includes Dean David Gibson and Dr. William Hait

NEWARK — A number of distinguished faculty and members of the UMDNJ community have been named to the Presidential Search Committee, by the UMDNJ Board of Trustees.

Public members of the committee were named at last week’s monthly board meeting. The panel will be led by Harold T. Shapiro, Ph.D., a UMDNJ trustee and president emeritus and professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University.

Board Chairman Robert Del Tufo said the remaining nominees complete the panel, which is currently conducting a national search for the University’s next permanent president.

“We owe these new members of the committee a debt of gratitude,” said Del Tufo. “These are accomplished, distinguished individuals, who have agreed to share their significant and varied expertise to help select our next president as we move the institution forward. It is important that the University community be directly involved in the search process. They are of course much affected by a decision on who shall lead.”

The newest committee members are:

· David Gibson, EdD, Dean of UMDNJ’s School of Health Related Professions and professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at SHRP. He currently serves as president of the National Association of Schools of Allied Health Professions.

· William N. Hait, MD, PhD, has served as Director of The Cancer Institute of New Jersey (CINJ) and as Associate Dean, Professor of Medicine and Pharmacology at UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School for the past thirteen years. Under Dr. Hait’s leadership, CINJ was successful in obtaining cancer center designation from the National Cancer Institute in 1996 and received the National Cancer Institute’s highest designation of Comprehensive Cancer Center in 2002.

· Isaac Hopkins, a community member of UMDNJ’s Institutional Review Board for for the past 16 years, is a Newark businessman. He is chairman of the advisory committee to Howard University’s Research and Training Center for Access to Rehabilitation and Economic Opportunity in Wash., D.C.; he is also a member of the National Office of Human Research Protection Committee.

· Joseph E. Parillo, MD, professor of medicine at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in Camden; Head, Division of Cardiovascular Disease and Critical Care Medicine; Director, Cooper Heart Institute; and Director, Cardiovascular and Critical Care Services at Cooper Health System in Camden.

· Ann Stock, PhD, a faculty member at the Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine, Professor of Biochemistry at RWJMS and Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. She is a Master Educator of UMDNJ and recipient of an NIH MERIT Award. She serves on the Board of Scientific Counselors of NIH-NIDCR and on the editorial board of the Journal of Bacteriology.

· Debbie Salas-Lopez, M.D., chief of the Division of Academic Medicine, Geriatrics and Community Programs, the largest division in the Department of Medicine at New Jersey Medical School. She is nationally recognized for her expertise in culturally competency and development of language programs for underserved communities.

· Carman A. Ciervo, DO, FACOFP, is chairman and associate professor of the Department of Family Medicine at the UMDNJ - School of Osteopathic Medicine. He serves on many national, regional and institutional committees, and is President of the New Jersey Chapter of the American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians (ACOFP) and a fellow in the national ACOFP.

Previously appointed members of the panel include: Eric S. Pennington, Esq., an attorney and vice chair of the UMDNJ Board of Trustees; Anthony P. Terracciano, a UMDNJ trustee and a businessman with an extensive background in banking and finance; Anita V. Spivey, Esq., a UMDNJ trustee and attorney; the Hon. Brendan T. Byrne, the 47th governor of New Jersey; retired New Jersey Supreme Court Justice Alan B. Handler; Dr. William F. Owen, a research scientist and chancellor of the University of Tennessee Health Science Center; Carlos Hernández, Ph.D., president of New Jersey City University; Neil L. Rudenstine, Ph.D., former president of Harvard University and Provost Emeritus of Princeton University; and Dr. Michael B. Wood, an orthopedic surgeon, researcher and president emeritus of the Mayo Foundation.

In addition to the committee members, two individuals will serve in an ex-officio role on the panel. They are: Jane Oates, executive director of the New Jersey Commission on Higher Education and UMDNJ’s Board Chairman Del Tufo, a former U.S. Attorney and former New Jersey Attorney General.

UMDNJ is the nation’s largest free-standing public health sciences university with more than 5,500 students attending the state's three medical schools, its only dental school, a graduate school of biomedical sciences, a school of health related professions, a school of nursing and a school of public health on five campuses. Annually, there are more than two million patient visits at UMDNJ facilities and faculty at campuses in Newark, New Brunswick/Piscataway, Scotch Plains, Camden and Stratford. UMDNJ operates University Hospital, a Level I Trauma Center in Newark, and University Behavioral HealthCare, a mental health and addiction services network.