Dr. Kerry Green, a prevention scientist and professor, has been named chair of the Department of Behavioral and Community Health within the University of Maryland School of Public Health. Green previously served as acting chair.
Green will provide strategic direction and academic leadership in a dynamic environment, guiding the department toward advanced research, teaching and service, leading community engagement and teaching and training in social and behavioral health. As chair, she will advance the School’s mission to “promote and protect the health and well-being of the diverse communities throughout Maryland, the nation and the world through leadership and collaboration in interdisciplinary education, research, practice and public policy.”
Kerry Green is a powerful force for public health good, as evidenced by her robust and impactful research to improve community health, her many awards for teaching and mentoring, and her leadership across department, school and our university as a whole.
In addition to her duties as chair, Green will continue to train and mentor students and early career prevention scientists as co-director of the Society for Prevention Research’s Early Career and Undergraduate Mentoring Program. She will also continue to serve as principal investigator of The Woodlawn Study and conduct her National Institutes of Health-funded research on childhood sexual abuse. Green also was recently elected to serve on the Board of the Maryland Public Health Association and serves on the xFoundry Development Council.
“After almost 18 years at the University of Maryland, I am excited for the opportunity to lead the Department of Behavioral and Community Health for the next five years and embrace the University of Maryland’s promise of fearless leadership. As chair, I will prioritize research and teaching excellence, commit to meaningful community engagement and collaborate and advocate for health equity and social justice.”
Green’s research expertise focuses on improving the health and well-being of disadvantaged populations. Much of her work focuses on identifying the causes of health disparities over the life course among urban African Americans.
Green’s work examines longitudinal cohorts, mostly urban cohorts followed from childhood to adulthood. As principal investigator for the Woodlawn Study, a community cohort study that began in 1965, Green coordinated the midlife follow-up (age 42) in 2002-03 and led the age 62 follow-up with funding from the National Institute on Aging (NIA). Her work has had continuous NIH funding since 2006.
Green joined the SPH faculty in 2007 as an assistant professor after completing a post-doctoral fellowship in Prevention Science at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 2013 and full professor in 2020.
“Kerry Green is a powerful force for public health good, as evidenced by her robust and impactful research to improve community health, her many awards for teaching and mentoring, and her leadership across department, school and our university as a whole,” said Dean Boris Lushniak. “We know she will continue to make the Department of Behavioral and Community Health a national leader in research, teaching and meaningful community collaborations.”