Written by Tanya Terry, with featured photo by Tanya Terry
Featured photo: Jennifer Johnson, PhD, founding chair of the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health and Bishop Bernadel Jefferson, the first elected member from the community to serve on the department’s public health executive committee, represent a partnership between the medical community and the people of Flint.
A ribbon cutting on August 26 celebrated Michigan State University College of Human Medicine’s new expansion to its public health research facility in Flint. Eighteen additional researchers and a staff, which could end up being made up of over 200 people, will focus on health equity, social determinants of health, behavioral health, healthy behaviors, chronic disease, maternal-child health and environmental justice, along with other topics, in the building.
The department has received more than $200 million in external funding for its first-of-its kind collaboration, involving community members themselves. The expansion is now part of the Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health. The Michigan State University College of Human Medicine also partnered with the City of Flint and Uptown Reinvestment Corporation to make it possible for the 40,000-square-foot addition to now house the department downtown in the former Flint Journal building, at First and Harrison streets.
Speakers at the celebration included Michigan State University President Kevin Guskiewicz, MSU College of Human Medicine Dean Aron Sousa, Mayor Sheldon Neeley, Uptown Reinvestment Corporation President Tim Herman, C.S. Mott Foundation Vice President Neal Hegarty, Bishop Bernadel Jefferson – the first elected member from the community to serve on the department’s public health executive committee and Jennifer Johnson, PhD, founding chair of the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health.
Guskiewicz said: “Our faculty and community partners, including the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, are proving what is possible when research is done side by side with the community it serves.”
Some the work those efforts helped produce include:
- The Reach Out, Stay Strong Essentials, or ROSE, for expecting mothers and mothers of infants, which has been shown to cut postpartum depression rates in half.
- Rx Kids, the nation’s first-ever community-wide prenatal and infant cash prescription program, now present in other Michigan cities after starting in Flint.
- The Flint Registry which has provided more than 35,000 referrals to services and became recognized as a national model through the city’s water crisis.
- The Fruit and Vegetable Prescription Program which offers Genesee County children a $15 voucher for fresh fruits and vegetables each time a child visits the pediatrician.
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More than 100 attendees celebrated the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the MSU College of Human Medicine’s Flint expansion. Photo courtesy of Josh Kennedy, MSU College of Human Medicine.
Sousa stated of Spartans: “We don’t just study problems, we innovate solutions and demonstrate the effectiveness of those solutions, so what is discovered in Flint can help people across the state and the country….”
Neeley said the expansion – and every brick laid and dollar invested in – was a testament to the city’s belief in health, hope and opportunity.
Herman called the the facility a “first class space,” pointing out it was near the Flint Farmer’s Market, in a health and wellness district.
Hegarty noted the Mott Foundation believed so much in the work that they granted a $25 million in December of 2021to expand MSU’s presence in Flint specifically. Shortly afterwards, the Mott Foundation granted $17 million for the new building, in addition to other funding it has provided over the years.
Jefferson noted community members were part of the decision making process for the department, from hiring of faculty to the designing of the mural which hangs where the recent celebration took place.
She added: “I’m excited because they thought enough of our community, of our voice, of our ideas, of our needs – and they came in not to take over, but to work together.”
Johnson shared that the community approached the MSU College of Human Medicine to expand a medical school presence in Flint. Based on that, the department was designed.
Johnson added: “We actually have community members on all our committees, in all our work. We are the first department…to be co-created and co-led with the community.”
Johnson said Flint residents are master and nationally known community organizers, and if everyone would have listened to them, the problems associated with Flint Water Crisis could have been avoided.
Jefferson stated: “We the people trust this department because we co-created it…Together, we will win.”
