February 29, 2016 

To mark the Arnold School of Public Health’s 40th Anniversary (1975-2015), please join us for an array of school-wide and department-sponsored events on March 18 (and several held earlier in the week) as we celebrate 40 years of history, growth and achievements.

In the 1970s, public health was evolving from a second degree for medical professionals to a primary health discipline, and in 1975, what is now known as the Arnold School of Public Health was established in USC’s new College of Public Health and Associated Health Programs. Two years later, the Arnold School became the 19th accredited school of public health in the United States and remains the only school of public health in South Carolina.

In 1991, the College of Health became the renamed School of Public Health with the current six departments: Communication Sciences and Disorders; Environmental Health Sciences; Epidemiology and Biostatistics; Exercise Science; Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior; Health Services Policy and Management. Then, in 2000, Columbia business leader Norman J. Arnold and his wife, Gerry Sue, gifted $10 million to create an endowment to support the teaching, research and public education efforts of the School. The School of Public Health was named in Mr. Arnold’s honor and became the third school of public health in the U.S., and the first at a public institution, to be nominally endowed. In 2015, the Arnolds gifted another $7 million to create the Gerry Sue and Norman J. Arnold Institute on Aging, which will focus on aging well by addressing issues faced by our most vulnerable populations—children and older adults.

Today, the Arnold School has more than 1,800 undergraduates in public health and exercise science and 730 graduate students in 27 programs across eight disciplines. The School’s 130+ faculty members produced 535 peer-reviewed publications (Calendar Year 2015) and received nearly $36 million (Fiscal Year 2015) in extramural funding—a third record year in a row—and they are frequently recognized with prestigious state and national awards.

Our growth continues with popular undergraduate programs, active faculty recruitment and a robust and diverse research agenda encompassing health disparities, cancer prevention, physical activity, nutrition, neuroimaging, environmental toxicology/microbiology, speech fluency and literacy, tobacco control, sexual health, diabetes and clinical research. Arnold School undergraduate students are learning the importance of leadership in public health programming and research through the “graduation with leadership distinction” program at USC. Forty-six of our baccalaureates achieved this distinction last year, and we lead the University in this important effort.

Our graduate students engage in interprofessional education and teamwork training to bring multidisciplinary expertise to solving the difficult health issues of our times. They also publish their research often and well alongside their faculty mentors in peer-reviewed journals. We have the sixth highest proportion of doctoral graduates among all 52 accredited schools of public health in the U.S., and our graduate students consistently win campus, state and national honors in scholarship, academic achievement and service. Our doctoral program in exercise science was recently recognized “No. 1 in the USA” by the National Academy of Kinesiology. 

We now have four Smartstate™ Centers in the Arnold School that focus on environmental nanotechnology, healthful lifestyles through technology, improved orthopedic outcomes, and improved healthcare quality through translational clinical research. These centers are on the cutting edge of innovative research, bringing critical discoveries and processes to life, such as inexpensive and eco-friendly technologies for environmental cleanup and innovative electronic games to get children moving more.

Our service and outreach programs impact various populations across South Carolina and beyond. The Dementia Dialogues Program, which has trained 21,000 South Carolinians to serve as caregivers for individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and dementia, is now undergoing a national rollout. PASOs has earned national recognition as a model for public health intervention and is working to improve the health of Latino families in our state through prenatal programs, connection to needed medical resources, and bilingual education about women’s and family health topics. Each year, our USC Speech and Hearing Research Center logs > 6,000 patient visits and 225 patient outreach hours, providing diagnostic and treatment services for individuals of all ages who have communication challenges in the areas of articulation, fluency, voice, language and literacy, and hearing.

Please come and help us celebrate our collective achievements over the past four decades. We are so looking forward to the next 40 years. Please find an abbreviated schedule of events below. Click here for more details and registration (required for most events).

Event	Date/Time/Location	Organized By
Presentation by David Buchner	March 15; 1pm; PHRC 114	Exercise Science
Film/Discussion by Sean Norman	March 17; 7pm; PHRC 114	Environmental Health Sciences
6th Annual Nutrition Symposium	March 18; 8:30am-1:30pm; Alumni Center	Center for Research in Nutrition and Health Disparities
Mini-Symposium: Antibiotic Resistant Infections	March 18; 9-noon; Alumni Center	Environmental Health Sciences
Guided Nature Tour with Rudy Mancke	March 18; 10am; USC Horseshoe/McKissick Museum	Dean’s Office
Colloquium Series: Diet-associated Inflammation	March 18; 10-11:30am; Discovery 140	Cancer Prevention and Control Program
Free Hearing Screenings/ COMD Open House	March 18; 1-2:30pm; Keenen Building, Suite 300	Communication Sciences and Disorders
Presentation by Robert McKeown: What's Up (and Down) with the Nation's Health? Trends in Major Health Indicators	March 18; 1-2:30pm; Alumni Center	Epidemiology and Biostatistics
HPEB Open House	March 18; 2-3pm; Discovery 140	Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior
Presentation by James Naessens and Ryan Uitti	March 18; 3-4:15pm; Alumni Center	Health Services Policy and Management
Poster Session	March 18; All day (with presenters, 4:30-6pm); Alumni Center	Office of Research
Information Tables	March 18; 4:30-6pm; Alumni Center	Cancer Prevention and Control Program; Center for Environmental NanoScience and Risk; Consortium for Latino Immigration Studies; Office for the Study of Aging; PASOs Programs
Reception	March 18; 6-8pm; Alumni Center	Dean’s Office