Grant creates scholars program in health, society

In the last decade, the idea that the health of individuals and populations is determined by a host of factors has steadily gained credibility among the academic and policy-making community.

Thanks to a $4.6 million grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, UW–Madison scholars will have an excellent opportunity to study this concept further.

The grant will fund the creation of the Health and Society Scholars Program, whose central component is a two-year fellowship designed to attract top researchers from the social, behavioral, natural and health sciences. The program will train scholars to investigate connections among biological, behavioral, environmental, economic and social factors that influence health, as well as to develop strategies and interventions based on these factors.

The first three scholars will begin work at UW–Madison next August.

Twenty-one U.S. institutions were initially invited to apply for the Health and Society Scholars Program, but UW–Madison was one of only six schools to receive a grant under the program. The other institutions are Columbia University, Harvard University, the University of California at San Francisco and at Berkeley, the University of Michigan and the University of Pennsylvania.

The program will also support development of a population health infrastructure involving UW–Madison and community partners via a competitive internal grant process.

“Our goal is to recruit creative scholars from traditionally unrelated disciplines to energize innovative thinking about all aspects of population health,” says John Mullahy, professor of population health science and UW’s co-director of the Health and Society Scholars Program.

David Kindig, UW–Madison emeritus professor of population health sciences, and Stephanie Robert, UW–Madison assistant professor of social work, will serve with Mullahy as co-directors.