First published on December 9, 2019 in observance of the COPH’s 35^th anniversary celebration.

In 2018, the USF College of Public Health (COPH) resurrected its Public Health Executive Leadership Program, which had been dormant for 10 years.

The program aims to bring rising leaders in the Florida Department of Health (FDOH) together to “collaborate and improve upon their own as well as their agency’s effectiveness,” said Dr. Marissa Levine, a COPH professor and co-director of the program along with Dr. Anthony Masys, an associate professor and director of global disaster management, humanitarian assistance and homeland security. “We revived the program not to teach public health skills, but to bring out leadership skills.”

Last year’s program brought 28 FDOH professionals—everyone from bureau chiefs to doctors and nurses to lab executives—to the USF Tampa campus several times over the course of nine months to attend workshops and presentations. In between the sessions, the group performed online work and discussions.

“The students evaluated their own leadership skill growth at the beginning and end of the program,” explained Levine. “Based on this, we saw a significant increase in self-assessed leadership skills. In addition, each student completed a capstone project relevant to their work at their base of operations. Each project was impactful and some had the potential for state- or national-level effectiveness.”

As an added bonus, many students in the program who did not initially know each other created professional relationships. “That will not only help them personally, but it will also enhance the work and impact of the department,” noted Levine.

Hurricane season pushed back the start of this year’s program, but in November 30 FDOH workers came to campus to open the 2019 program and begin fine-tuning their leadership skills. 

“This is another dynamic group who we will meet again in person four more times between now and May. Next month we will be exploring leadership in a political context and will convene in Tallahassee where we will view committee meetings and learn about all levels of government budget and policy making,” said Levine.

The Center for Leadership in Public Health Practice, the COPH group that puts on the program, has an annual contract with the FDOH. According to Levine, the group is looking to expand its offerings to engage other public health professionals. “We’re disseminating information to our graduates and others interested in leadership so that we can create a robust resource for leaders working to collaboratively improve health and well-being,” said Levine

.Story by Donna Campisano, USF College of Public Health

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Eight recent graduates of the USF College of Public Health (COPH) Public Health Executive Leadership Program (PHELP) have been promoted to health officer/administrator positions at health departments across the state.

Health officers within the Florida Department of Health (FDOH) are the lead public health officials for the counties in which they serve. They are responsible for their department’s operations and any response to community public health events, concerns or disasters.

After a hiatus of several years, the COPH revived PHELP with the aim of teaching and reinforcing leadership skills among early-to-mid career FDOH managers and supervisors who have demonstrated leadership potential. Since its resurrection four years ago, 75 FDOH employees have graduated from the program.

“The program provides those who enroll with new skills and knowledge, but maybe, most importantly, the opportunity for personal leadership development,” Dr. Marissa Levine, a professor of public health practice and director of the Center for Leadership in Public Health Practice, said. “That includes enhancement of the mindset necessary to be a successful leader.” 

The eight PHELP grads recently promoted to health officer include:

“I wanted to take part to learn how to be a better leader, to network and ultimately to advance in the field of public health,” said Kimberly Kossler, who served as a disease intervention specialist, an epidemiologist, a program manager and in other capacities before being named health officer of Collier County in Dec. 2020. 

“I serve as the local lead public health official to provide direction, management, leadership and evaluation of a wide variety of complex and multi-faceted community public health programs,” she added. “This role is an essential part of the Florida public health system and is responsible for assessing, maintaining and improving the health and safety of the entire community.”

Kossler said taking part in the program was essential to advancing her career. 

“The program provided an opportunity to meet other colleagues who had similar ambitions, exchange experiences and share knowledge,” she said. “It gave me a chance to demonstrate my interest and desire to continue to advance my career in public health while learning valuable ways to improve my leadership skills.”

Meaghan Crowley, who at the time she was enrolled in the program served as director of community health in Marion County, agrees. 

“PHELP was an invaluable experience in my leadership journey, which still serves me on a daily basis, even today,” said Crowley, now health officer/administrator in Baker County. “Drs. Levine and Masys [a former COPH associate professor involved in the program] set the foundation by including a myriad of advanced leadership topics such as adaptive leadership, systems thinking, change management, appreciative inquiry, complexity in public health, communication and partnership, to name a few. Rather than merely ‘teaching’ us leadership, they acted as our champions in our leadership journey. I was able to implement many of these lessons while at DOH-Marion and feel they have served me even more in my current role as the DOH-Baker health officer/administrator.”

Crowley said she was so impressed by her PHELP experience, she decided to enroll in the COPH DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership in Public Health. 

“I have felt supported, encouraged and inspired by all the COPH faculty in my continued leadership journey,” she stated. “I can say without a doubt that [the program] has unquestionably helped me not only in my journey to become a health officer, but to create a culture of quality and excellence at DOH-Baker, where staff are encouraged to be leaders themselves, no matter their position, and to create positive change to better serve our community and one another.”

Story by Donna Campisano, USF College of Public Health

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The USF Health College of Public Health (COPH) Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) program emphasizes advanced public health education and training designed to prepare individuals for leadership roles in practice-based settings. Traditionally, the program is taught through a hybrid format of primarily distance-learning courses and three, five day on-campus institutes, but COVID-19 forced these live in-person institutes to shift to virtual delivery in 2020 through Microsoft Teams. The program is designed for working professionals in the public health field, with most recent cohorts averaging five or more years of field experience, to gain the opportunity to connect and collaborate with other doctoral students in both the DrPH and PhD programs and strengthen their skills for public health leadership, practice and research without interrupting their careers. These doctoral students come from a wide range of fields including epidemiology, county and state level disaster and emergency preparedness and response, health education, health law, laboratory operations management, maternal and child health, social work, food insecurity, and others. They work across federal and state government agencies along with local county health departments, healthcare organizations, non-profits, universities, consulting practices, to name a few.

COVID-19 clearly had other plans in mind for the program and for the careers of current USF Health DrPH students who immediately became key parts of COVID-19 operations across the country and abroad. These students stepped up, represented public health in their organization’s interprofessional teams and really demonstrated the College of Public Health’s motto, “our practice is our passion.” The following biographical sketches provide summaries of the backgrounds and a focus on the roles these DrPH students are contributing in their communities in the fight against COVID-19.

Stephanie Anspaugh-Naples, MPH

State Medical Countermeasure (MCM) Coordinator, Florida Department of Health (DOH)

PINELLAS COUNTY, FL – Anspaugh-Naples’ job on a daily basis is to help plan for the mass dispensing and mass vaccination of the State of Florida. The importance of her role heightened when COVID-19 broke out and once the vaccines became available, “all the work we’ve done to build partnerships, upgrade systems and learn from previous responses will be put to the test,” Anspaugh-Naples said. “It’s exciting and terrifying.”

In addition to being the chairperson for the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) MCM Coordinators Workgroup, she is currently part of the state’s COVID-19 Response Team for Emergency Support Function 8 – Public Health and Medical (ESF-8) and leads the COVID-19 Mass Vaccination Planning Workgroup. “We are developing strategies to ensure that everyone in the state will have access to a COVID-19 vaccine as doses become available,” Anspaugh-Naples said. “Florida is a very diverse state, so we are engaging other agencies and organizations to work through existing channels to expand our ability to reach everyone in the state.”

Anspaugh-Naples is based out of Pinellas County, Florida, but the rest of her Bureau working on this effort together is in Tallahassee. Her work in public health response is always a collaborative effort and when it’s all-hands-on-deck for an outbreak like COVID-19, the teamwork not only includes internal partners at DOH but also other state agencies, community partners, the Florida Division of Emergency Management, Florida Hospital Association, American Medical Response, International Medical Corps, county emergency management agencies and many others. “Relationships are a critical part of preparedness and response work,” Anspaugh-Naples said.

Originally a USF Bull, Anspaugh-Naples’ educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Biology from USF and a Master of Public Health in Epidemiology from Emory University. In 2016, she returned to her alma mater in for the DrPH program because it was the only program that was flexible enough for a working professional and had the ability to tailor the education based on her interests. When I looked at other public health doctoral programs, there wasn’t another DrPH program that paralleled USF’s,” Anspaugh-Naples said. “I only applied to USF and my plan was to continue applying until I got in. Thankfully, I was accepted on my first try but I was ready to be persistent for however long it took.”

Her studies in the program have focused on public health preparedness and response and systems thinking/theories. Since Anspaugh-Naples started the program prior to COVID, she was able to participate in an in-person fall institute. In her first class, Joe Bohn, PhD, MBA, assistant professor and deputy director of the USF Health DrPH Program, covered systems thinking and similar theories which really resonated with her. Dr. Bohn soon became her faculty advisor and has helped her shape her doctoral project. Through discussions with Dr. Bohn and Marissa Levine, MD, MPH, FAAFP, professor and director of the USF Health Center for Leadership in Public Health Practice (CLPHP), about her doctoral project, she learned about Cynefin, a conceptual framework used to aid decision-making. “When the COVID-19 Mass Vaccination Planning Workgroup first started, I shared a graphic of the Cynefin framework with the team,” Anspaugh-Naples said. “Planning a mass vaccination campaign with so many unknowns has been a challenge but employing concepts from Cynefin helped me to focus on what we do know, rather than on what we didn’t/don’t know.”

COVID-19 has reinforced her passion for public health preparedness and response. “There’s a certain ebb and flow to the work that ensures I’m never bored or unchallenged and I appreciate that. Plus, I feel like the work I’m doing helps people, even if they never know I’m doing it,” Anspaugh-Naples said.

Planning a state mass vaccination campaign has slowed down the progress Anspaugh-Naples wanted to make on her doctoral plan, but she’s grateful to have friends in her cohort who are in a similar position and remind her that, “every step, no matter how small, is still a step forward.” Anspaugh-Naples stresses the importance of maintaining professional working relationships and she feels that the best part of the DrPH program has been her ability to build those lasting relationships with her classmates and professors.

Jennifer Gunderman, MPH

Director of the Maine Area Health Education Center (AHEC), University of New England

PORTLAND, ME – As a leader in workforce development with specific focus on rural and underserved communities, the work of the Maine AHEC Network highlights the strengths, challenges, and opportunities faced by populations vulnerable to health disparities. “COVID-19 has not changed my role, just the urgency in which things need to get accomplished,” said Gunderman.

The Maine AHEC Network has used CARES Act funds for health profession education programs to promote the use of telehealth technologies and continue its mission to provide workforce develop opportunities while enhancing the prevention, preparation, and response to COVID-19. Preparation activities have included Project ECHO programming, trainings at health profession schools, and continuing education on self-care and resiliency. UNE has recently become a Project ECHO hub and AHEC staff have completed training to implement ECHO sessions.  The Program Office is working with students in health profession programs to offer COVID 19 related training on PPE, screening, testing, treatment, and control measures. “None of the work of Maine AHEC could be done on our own,” said Gunderman. “We rely on networks of health care, public health, community-based organizations, private partnerships, governmental agencies, etc. Our work revolves around interprofessional and multisector collaborations. It takes a system to create sustainable change.”

The Program Office and Regional Centers is collaborating with health systems, Maine Chapters of healthcare affiliations, and others to offer continuing education opportunities to healthcare professionals related to self-care, resiliency, and mental health first aid. The Program Office is also partnering with Gateway Community Services, a community-based program serving refugees and immigrants, to assess the impact of COVID 19 on the community of immigrants and refugees and to identify ways to improve health outcomes.

In September 2020, Gunderman enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership. “I wanted to become the student,” said King. “I feel like I have reached a point in my personal and professional life that my skills could be enhanced and strengthened to have greater impact on public health.”

Her educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Health Policy and Management from Providence College in Rhode Island, and a Master’s in Public Health with a certificate in Maternal and Child Health Epidemiology from Emory University in Georgia. Gunderman chose the University of South Florida for her DrPH because of the focus in leadership development and public health practice within the context of application in the real world. “I appreciate the general care the faculty and staff have for the students and creating an authentic learning environment,” said Gunderman. “While I am still in my first semester, the course work has been immediately applicable to my work. The models and concepts taught by Dr. Levine has been immediately applied to enhancing my leadership style as I guide my team of staff through these unprecedented times. What I have learned about social marketing in Dr. Pasha’s class has allowed me to use this framework when talking about addressing the infodemic related to COVID-19. I even included it in a panel in which I participated.”

The work of public health professionals is often happening behind the scenes, but COVID-19 pushed it to the forefront and turned on a spotlight for the general public to have a better understanding of what public health does and its important role in our world. “Public health is in everything,” said Gunderman. “With public health’s foundation in equity and justice and basis in science, the core principles and values should be applied to just about anything we do in this world.”

Jarad Schiffer, MS

Supervisory Health Scientist and Advisor for Laboratory Preparedness, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

ATLANTA, GA – At the beginning of the outbreak, Schiffer was running an immunology laboratory at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In March, his team was asked to stand up serology testing for COVID surveillance. “We took a research assay to measure anti-Spike IgG and modified it to increase the throughput from 10 specimens/run to 88 specimens/run, validated it using ~100 PCR-confirmed COVID samples and ~300 negative samples we had left from pre-COVID studies,” said Schiffer. “From April to October we tested a little over 112,000 specimens. Our data was the basis for Dr. Redfield’s interview where he indicated that there were ~10 unconfirmed cases for each confirmed case.”

Schiffer’s laboratory was originally set up for the Anthrax Vaccine Research Program and then they went on to work on the Pertussis vaccine as well as provide laboratory support for the 2009 H1N1 outbreak, the 2014 Ebola outbreak and STRIVE vaccine trial, and the 2016 Zika outbreak. Once the COVID-19 began, like most organizations, all but the most critical non-COVID work was put on hold. “Our work practices changed to maximize telework and social distancing for laboratory work, working in shared spaces felt more like working in the BSL-3 laboratory,” said Schiffer.

Schiffer changed jobs in October, where most of his current work is not COVID-related, but instead, looking at ways to improve laboratory preparedness for emergency responses across CDC, and in state and local public health laboratories. The one exception is the new collaboration with Operation Warp Speed on a non-human primate trial to try to establish a correlate of protection for COVID vaccines.

In August 2020, Schiffer enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program. He originally was concentrating in Clinical Laboratory Science and Practice but has since switched to Advanced Practice Leadership to better suit his change in jobs. His educational background includes a Bachelor of Arts in Molecular Biology and a Master of Science in Biology. “While my Biology background and experience is strong, I do a lot of collaborations with epidemiologists,” said Schiffer. “I have learned on the job what I needed for each project with them, but always felt that I had gaps in my knowledge of epidemiology in general.” Schiffer had been looking for several years for some type of doctoral program, but most required either on-site or full-time learning, and he did not want to leave his current job. “The USF program is the first one I found that was both highly rated and feasible to do while working full time,” said Schiffer. The DrPH program is his first experience with extensive on-line remote learning, but thanks to COVID, his youngest is also using Canvas for virtual high school, so they’re learning to navigate online school together.

The courses in the DrPH program are already making a difference in Schiffer’s career, as he was able to make useful contributions towards the CDC’s new framework for Public Health Preparedness and Response research, with emphasis on a systems approach and improving health equity, without having to first play catch-up on those issues. Schiffer also excitedly recalls that the gap in his research toolbox is already shrinking because, “in a recent meeting with our extramural research director she started talking about the social determinants of health, and thanks to my first semester courses I actually knew what she was talking about.”

Alida Gertz, MD, MPH, MSc

Core Faculty in the Family Medicine Residency Program, WellStar Healthcare System

ATLANTA, GA – Dr. Gertz is a Board-Certified Family Physician and helps to take care of patients in outpatient clinics and hospitals in the WellStar Healthcare System. Since COVID-19, her calendar became a bit more packed with multiple weekly team meetings about implementing new safety protocols for the family medicine outpatient clinic, reviewing current literature for clinical care of patients in the hospital with COVID-19 and discussing, approving and guiding COVID-19 research conducted within WellStar hospital and clinic. “The decisions we make have a direct impact on the care given to our patients,” Dr. Gertz said. “One of the biggest challenges is people are really scared of COVID-19, including our staff.” One decision that was presented at the outpatient clinic faculty meeting was whether COVID-19 testing should be offered at the clinic. While offering rapid testing breaks now barriers to access for patients, it also encourages potentially COVID-positive patients to come to the clinic, putting the staff, residents and students at risk. Once the clinic’s team determined that they had the proper protocols in place, such as enough personal protective equipment (PPE), they ultimately made the decision to offer COVID-19 testing.

Another challenge was the clinic normally offered home visits which was a critical way to reach the more vulnerable populations such as the working-class African Americans and Hispanic, Latinx and Vietnamese immigrants living just South of Atlanta. Like for many healthcare systems, COVID-19 pushed WellStar’s telehealth platform to be rolled out across the entire healthcare system instead of its previously limited availability. Unfortunately, telehealth often leaves out the more vulnerable populations and so the clinic staff are, “trying really hard to continue to offer them services, but in a safe way for the staff,” Dr. Gertz said.

Dr. Gertz’s educational background includes a Medical Degree and Master of Public Health from Case Western Reserve University and a Master of Science in Epidemiology and a Professional Diploma in Tropical Medicine and Hygiene from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She completed two years of Internal Medicine residency at Johns Hopkins University, and two years of Family Medicine residency at the University of Pennsylvania and a Global Health Fellowship at the University of Washington and another through Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. Dr. Gertz decided to pursue a DrPH with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership, because she was interested in transitioning to a career in public health and while she already has an MPH, she wanted a more solid, formal training in public health as well as additional experience and training in statistics and particularly using SAS

While completing her first semester of the DrPH program, Dr. Gertz is developing an anti-racism curriculum for her resident students at WellStar. “I received input from my professors on the best way to develop the program so that it is grounded in research and the curriculum can be evaluated in a meaningful way,” Dr. Gertz said. “It wouldn’t have been as well designed without the supervision and guidance from my professors because it wouldn’t have been done in such a systematic and structured way.” The assignments in the program are often directly or indirectly influenced by the pandemic and Dr. Gertz notes that she feels a unique sense of urgency to complete her work because the research can influence the current state of affairs. For example, in her Social Marketing course, she is on a team that is focusing on decreasing COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among African Americans.

Already following through with her desire to transition to a career in public health, Dr. Gertz recently accepted a position with the CDC in the Division of Global Migration and Quarantine. According to the CDC, their mission is to, “reduce morbidity and mortality among immigrants, refugees, travelers, expatriates, and other globally mobile populations, and to prevent the introduction, transmission, and spread of communicable diseases through regulation, science, research, preparedness, and response.” COVID-19 created the need for a team member specifically dedicated to COVID-19 protocols and that will soon be Dr. Gertz’s role. The job is based out of the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and focuses on traveler health for various major airports in the U.S. as well as for a number of seaports.

While each student shares a desire to gain more knowledge and expertise in the public health field, each student has their own specific interests and different needs. Even just one semester into the program, Dr. Gertz appreciates the individualized attention she has received from the supportive and responsive faculty. “The faculty are kind and caring and very knowledgeable about their areas of expertise. They each bring their own perspective and a lot of experience,” Dr. Gertz said.

Sarah Scharf, MPH

Founding Member and Chief Administrative Officer of MD1 Program

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ – While working full time at Rutgers University as Program Manager of Population Sciences in Administration and Planning at Rutgers Cancer Institute, Scharf helped found as a 501c3, the MD1 Program. MD1 specializes in bringing 24/7, immediate life-saving care to the scene of an incident when patients are unable to get to the hospital such as in the case of entrapment or a mass casualty incident. In regards to COVID-19, MD1 has also trained more than 120 first responders on the proper use of personal protective equipment (PPE), helped facilitate logistics for various testing and vaccination programs in New Jersey and across the United States and intubated patients while wearing powered air purifying respirators (PAPRs) in order to reduce risk of viral transmission to paramedics. “COVID has pivoted our life saving model. With fewer cars on the road, fewer citizens out and about and fewer flights in the skies, COVID has become a main focus of our life saving endeavors, especially during the peak of the pandemic in the NJ/NY area,” said Scharf.

In August 2020, Scharf enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership. Her educational background includes a Master’s in Public Health from Rutgers University. “The field of public health is rapidly expanding due to several factors and will continue even more so to need passionate, dedicated and trained individuals,” said Scharf. “I decided to pursue a DrPH to gain new perspectives, insights, and techniques to build upon my current skill set. I hope to develop advanced problem-solving skills and help strengthen my credibility as well as increase opportunities.” She chose to continue her education at USF because the program is ranked among the top 5 online DrPH programs. So far, Scharf has been enjoying the intellectually rich environment, passion and expertise of the faculty and diverse group of cohorts, and she looks forward to the day when it’s safe to meet some of her classmates in person.

“Ultimately my aim as a public health professional is to promote and protect the health of people and the communities where they live, learn, work, and play,” said Scharf. “I wholeheartedly believe this Doctorate of Public Health in Advanced Practice Leadership will help me become a better leader and make a greater impact towards the overall betterment of society. I am truly honored to have been accepted into this program and look forward to this enriching journey.”

Shara Wesley, DrPH, MPH

Executive Director of the Center for Health Equity (WCHE) and Community Health Department, WellStar Healthcare System

ATLANTA, GA – Dr.Wesley leads new and expansions of current initiatives that address social determinants of health and health equity with the goal of reducing systemic disparities and their impact on communities for WellStar, one of the largest integrated healthcare systems in Georgia. Supported by an interdisciplinary team, Dr. Wesley helped to launch COVID pop-up testing sites, a mobile food market, a Community Transformation Program and a Health Equity Series. “COVID has reinforced the power of enhancing collaboration and effective partnerships among all sectors and stakeholders,” Dr. Wesley said. “Our country is highly interconnected; we are all part of an interdependent system, where the sharing of ideas, information, knowledge, and movement people and of goods, are truly boundless. This interconnectedness is also the basis for our health system, and as any system, the strength of all parts is crucial.”

The initial efforts in the summer were focused on increasing COVID testing accessibility in communities of color by deploying small teams to neighborhood-based pop-up sites to offer drive up and walk up COVID testing. Safety kits were also available at these sites and included a mask, hand sanitizer, and information from the CDC. “Oftentimes, these sites were faith-based organizations that are a part of WellStar’s Congregational Health Network,” Dr. Wesley said. “We found that offering these smaller events allowed us to be flexible so we could be deployed to any hotspots and ensure we were offering culturally/linguistically appropriate education.”

COVID testing is not the only pop-ups Dr. Wesley’s team has brought to Atlanta. Through their 2019 Community Health Needs Assessment (CHNA), Dr. Wesley’s team knows that many of their community members are struggling with consistent food access or food insecurity and that has only been exacerbated by COVID. “By partnering with Goodr, we will begin hosting seven monthly markets that offer a free grocery shopping experience for 700 families,” Dr. Wesley said.

In addition, they successfully launched their Community Transformation Program which is piloting five initiatives that leverage the use of technology to increase access to healthcare and/or social support. “The COVID-19 pandemic unmasked dramatic disparities, with African Americans and Latinx community members accounting for a disproportionate share of COVID-19 infections, hospitalizations, and deaths,” Dr. Wesley said. “Crises often amplify existing inequities and highlight the urgent need to address the root causes of health inequities.” WellStar Health System’s Center for Health Equity and the Georgia Health Policy Center hosted a six part webinar series focused on achieving equity in Georgia, in partnership with the Atlanta Regional Collaboration for Health Improvement and the Partnership for Southern Equity. “This series will engage community, clinical, and other partners in building a community-level understanding of health equity by exploring the root causes of common and persistent inequities and providing evidence-informed, practical tips and tools to address these inequities in Georgia,” Dr. Wesley said.

Now in 2021, the team will shift focus to add COVID vaccination education and, when available, administration. Dr. Wesley hopes to create an openness to receiving the vaccine but is faced with the challenge of the general public’s confusion about the virus and wanting to “wait and see” before receiving the vaccination, combined with Black Americans’ longtime mistrust of the medical community. “We know it is important for the community to see and hear public health leaders share their reasons for receiving the COVID vaccination,” Dr. Wesley said. “It is equally important that we also empathetically listen to their reservations and in response offer science-informed information.”

Dr. Wesley’s educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Biology with a minor in Chemistry in addition to a Master’s in Public Health. In 2017, she enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership, “because I wanted to reinforce what I learned in the field with contemporary applications of public health research,” Dr. Wesley said. Fortunately for Dr. Wesley, she completed most of the program prior to COVID and was able to participate in the in-person summer institutes which she recalls as her favorite part of the program. “While they were often intense and loaded with information, it was a great time to reconnect with the USF Health COPH community, faculty and staff,” Dr. Wesley said. “The endless conversations helped demystify coursework or program requirements because you could troubleshoot in real time with other students.” A small group of the 2017 DrPH Cohort have remained connected via WhatsApp, providing each other with encouragement to stay focused on the heightened demand in their careers and the DrPH graduation requirements.

Wesley closed out 2020 in celebratory fashion when she was deemed one of “Georgia’s best and brightest” with the prestigious 40 Under 40 award from Georgia Trend, followed by successfully defending her DrPH dissertation: Black Women Podcast Listenership and its Impact on Psychological Openness, Help-Seeking Propensity and Indifference to Stigma.

Meaghan K. Crowley, MPH

Director of Community Health for the Florida Department of Health (DOH)

MARION COUNTY, FL –Crowley has always wanted to work in public health ever since she was 7 years old and saw the movie, And The Band Played On. “I used to tell everybody, ‘I want to be an epidemiologist and virologist for the CDC and work on level 4 contagions,’” Crowley said. She used to work in global health and then she ended up moving to Florida and working for the Florida Department of Health (DOH) and falling in love with community health.

For the DOH, forming an Incident Management Team (IMT) is common practice for emergency response situations such as hurricanes or a Hepatitis A outbreak. IMTs follow the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) Incident Command System (ICS) Structure and contain the core leadership group that is going to be in charge of planning the response and then putting it into action. At the top of the chain of command is the Incident Commander followed by the Operations Chief, Logistics Chief, Medical Officer, Community Liaison, Public Information Officer (PIO) and finally, any additional roles as needed to respond to the emergency situation. The COVID IMT was formed in December 2019 when the news of COVID-19 first broke so when Florida reported its first case on March 20th, 2020, the IMT was already built out and it was time to put their plans into action. Within the structure of the COVID IMT, Crowley is the Community Liaison. Even though IMTs exist year-round, “they’re usually for acute issues like hurricanes,” Crowley said. “Even for the year and a half outbreak of Hepatitis A, the IMT only needed to meet once a week. The COVID IMT meets twice a day, every day and has been for the past year.”

The IMT is the lead agency in charge of all of the county’s planning and response efforts, but the Department of Health cannot put policies in place, they can only provide recommendations. Working with Emergency Management, recommendations such as wearing masks are given to the county commissioners, city council, the mayor, the sheriff and the police chief, and to the school board for policies and protocols.

In addition to being the community liaison on the COVID IMT, Crowley is also in charge of monitoring and response for all long term care facilities in Marion County, such as assisted living facilities, nursing homes and rehabilitation centers. In the beginning, to prepare the facilities, Crowley made sure that the staff understood infection control procedures, what signs and symptoms to be aware of, how often they should be testing the staff and residents, and that they had the correct personal protective equipment (PPE). The staff also needed to understand what to do in case they got a COVID-19 case and how the plan changes if it’s a positive staff member versus a positive resident. She started doing daily phone calls to all of the facilities to help monitor and in case they had any questions. Then Crowley went in person to every facility to help them with their preparedness plans. Once the facilities started getting positives, she went to the facilities to do an investigation on the case and try to find out the infection source and to implement mitigation and response strategies to keep the outbreak as contained as possible. “It spreads like wildfire in these facilities and they are our most fragile individuals,” Crowley said. “The majority of Marion County deaths have been in these facilities.”

Like for most organizations, COVID-19 has shut down the majority of the normal day-to-day operations for the DOH and efforts that use to be directed towards community outreach clinics and programs have now been redirected to COVID. “The dental clinic was shut down for 6 months, so a tiny cavity or a little bit of decay, which could have been prevented or mitigated earlier on, suddenly turns into an abscess or a major infection,” Crowley said. “It also created an additional burden on the hospital system because when people couldn’t get care, they went to the Emergency Room. On top of that, overdoses tripled within the first three months of COVID.”

According to Crowley, the silver lining of the pandemic is the improvement of interprofessionalism among her coworkers. “COVID has forced us to all work together as a team, because we are in the middle of an emergency that we have never seen in our lifetime,” Crowley said. “Everyone is learning each other’s roles and it has actually brought a lot more appreciation and understanding to what the different departments do. A lot of the staff has said that it has really been a great bonding experience, incredibly stressful, but an incredible bonding experience.”

Crowley’s educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Food Science and Human Nutrition from the University of Florida and a Master’s in Public Health from New York University. Crowley was also a part of the inaugural class of the newly revived USF Health Public Health Executive Leadership Program, designed for rising stars in the Florida Department of Health. It was through this program at USF, that Crowley met Anthony Masys, PhD and Marissa Levine, MD, MPH, faculty organizers of the program, who were very encouraging of the DrPH program. “They were absolutely incredible and inspiring,” said Crowley. “I loved having a different perspective and I loved the richness of what they were able to give.” Crowley realized that she missed academia and missed learning, especially from an academic medical center that is on the cutting-edge of technology and research. Even though she is a die-hard Gator, Crowley decided to take that next step in her career with USF because their DrPH program is top ranked in the country and she loved the kindness and support that she got from faculty even when she was just considering applying to the program.

According to Crowley, in a Master of Public Health, you get the basics, but the DrPh makes you think about public health at a higher level and from a very different, more holistic perspective. Even just one semester into the program, Crowley has found the DrPH program to be incredibly helpful in her career. Being in the program helped her IMT’s plans improve and at the same time, her work experience gives her resources to conduct the research she needs to get through the program. “Since we are able to choose our own topics for our assignments, I’ve been able to choose topics that I’m actually working on at work such as making sure that the COVID responses are implemented from a health equity perspective and our vaccine roll out plan,” Crowley said.

Crowley feels that she is incredibly lucky to be at the forefront of public health and to be a part of the COVID-19 response and a part of history.

Rachel Guran, MPH, BSN, RN, CIC

Director of Epidemiology and Infection Prevention, Memorial Healthcare System

HOLLYWOOD, FL – Prior to COVID-19, the name Rachel Guran might have been unknown to some of the staff at Memorial Healthcare System. Now, “every department knows who I am and how important infection control is in a healthcare system,” said Guran. Not only is Guran a role model for public health safety inside Memorial Healthcare System, but she also represents Memorial out in the community, often quoted as the subject expert on COVID and influenza prevention in local blogs, newspapers, and social media posts. “As the system director for all infection prevention activities, I have been involved in creating all hospital policies and procedures related to COVID including anything having to do with personal protective equipment and infection prevention and control steps to prevent the spread of COVID amongst the healthcare workers and patients,” said Guran. Hospitals are run with multidisciplanary teams on an everyday basis and it’s especially important when it comes to infection control. “Every team member in a hospital has a responsibility for ownership of infection control – hand washing and preventing cross contamination,” said Guran.

In August 2020, Guran enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership. “Hospital epidemiology and infection prevention is a growing part of the public health world. I would like to give back to our profession through translating our bedside experience into research and public policy,” said Guran. Her educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Psychology, a Master of Public Health in Health Promotion and Disease Prevention, and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. Guran decided to pursue a Doctorate because it’s, “a rigorous coursework that signifies true leadership and expertise in a chosen field of study,” said Guran. She chose USF Health’s program because of the national recognition in Public Health training with professors that are leaders in the field.

Even though Guran just recently started the program, she has already been able to apply some of the lessons to the real-world setting and says that working towards a Doctor of Public Health during a pandemic is a unique experience because it can be examine from a scholarly standpoint as it’s happening. She also appreciates the connections to her classmates that have allowed her to work on real-world activities with the Florida Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

Being the Director of Epidemiology and Infection Prevention for Memorial Healthcare System is Guran’s dream job and she couldn’t think of a better career.

Jennifer Loeffler-Cobia, M.S.

Senior Researcher and Deputy Director of the National Reentry Resource Center (NRRC), American Institutes for Research

WASHINGTON, D.C. –Treatment for vulnerable populations cannot stop even during a health crisis. As part of her role as the Deputy Director of the National Reentry Resource Center (NRRC), funded through the Bureau of Justice Assistance, Loeffler-Cobia provides technical assistance to department of corrections (DOC) across the country. “Specifically pertaining to the pandemic, I work with DOCs to identify challenges the system is currently facing when trying to balance evidence-based practices implementation, community safety, and the health of staff and those being served; innovations that the system is trying to implement to help overcome their challenges; and identify lessons learned to help their systems improve policies, procedures, and program to better prepare for future implementation readiness during a crisis of this magnitude,” said Loeffler-Cobia.

Implementation readiness has always been a part of the way Loeffler-Cobia works with systems trying to implement policies and interventions, but COVID-19 brought to the forefront the importance of that framework and highlighted some areas that needed improvement. “We want this population to be able to have the education and the resources not only to be able to succeed when they return to their communities and families, but also understand how to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and have access to the necessary health, employment, treatment, and housing resources,” said Loeffler-Cobia.

Her educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Public Health and a Master of Science in Health, both from Utah State University. Loeffler-Cobia wanted to focus on advancing her leadership skills to help impact system change and so in August 2020, she enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program to help bring her personal and professional plans to fruition and further her professional career. “I have always had a passion for public health, substance mis-use prevention and treatment, and overall just helping to provide a better quality of life for vulnerable populations,” said Loeffler-Cobia. She was accepted into all of the programs she applied to, but she chose USF because she felt the staff and curriculum were the best match with her professional interests. “The USF doctoral in public health curriculum will equip me with the requisite tools for developing, implementing, and evaluating evidence-informed public health approaches that are relevant in preventing and reducing substance mis-use and school and community violence, and incorporating these approaches to assist with juvenile and criminal justice system change,” said Loeffler-Cobia.

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In June, the USF College of Public Health’s (COPH) newly revived Public Health Executive Leadership Program graduated its first cohort of students in 10 years.

“In those 10 years, it was my understanding that there was a paucity of leadership training and formal programming for Florida Department of Health professionals,” explained Dr. Marissa Levine, a COPH practice pathway professor and one of the faculty organizers of the program. “We resurrected the program not to teach public health skills, but to bring out leadership skills.”

The program, designed for rising stars in the Florida Department of Health, brought public health executives across the state to the USF campus. Twenty-eight bureau chiefs, doctors, program administrators, lab executives, nurses and even IT professionals graduated the nine-month course that required five in-person, on-campus sessions with online work and discussion in-between.

At the end of the nine months, participants presented their capstone projects, which covered things like decreasing turnover by increasing morale and succession planning.

“The response from our participants has been excellent,” said Levine. “These are busy professionals who are working on this program in addition to their usual responsibilities and activities. And judging from the quality of their capstone projects, I think the program’s been important to them.”

Lylah Seaton, the chemical threat program administrator at the Bureau of Public Health Laboratories in Jacksonville, said she was drawn to the program because, as a newly appointed supervisor, she was interested in learning how things operated around the state.

“The Bureau of Public Health Labs, where I work, is different from how the county health departments work. What I really liked about the program was sharing information and perspective with the other participants and learning how things operate in their areas.”

While they learned from each other, participants also learned from a variety of expert speakers, including some from the CDC. Key topics covered were conflict resolution, effective communication, engaging employees and responding to the media.

“I think the most important thing I took away from the program was how to be a more open and approachable leader,” said Seaton. “If your staff knows that about you, it goes a long way.”

While this was a pilot program, Levine says its contract has been renewed by the Florida Department of Health. It will be back for a second year with just a few minor tweaks, such as starting midday instead of early morning to accommodate the travel schedules of people coming from all parts of the state.

“The basic tenets of the program are set and have been well received,” said Levine. “We’ll just be making logistical changes to make it easier for public health officials who lead very hectic lives to take part in the program and still have time to take care of their job duties and personal responsibilities.”

The next Public Health Executive Leadership cohort will be welcomed in September.

Story by Donna Campisano, USF College of Public Health

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