Jannette Berkley-Patton has been named a Curators’ Distinguished Professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. The title is the University of Missouri System’s most prestigious faculty honor. She currently teaches as an associate professor of biomedical and health informatics and directs the UMKC Health Equity Institute. Her research focuses on health inequities, education, prevention, and screening in underserved communities.
A three-time graduate of the University of Kansas, Dr. Berkley-Patton holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical and computer engineering, a master’s degree in human development and family life, and a Ph.D. in child and developmental psychology.
Michelle Gray was promoted to full professor in the department of neurology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Medicine. She joined the department of neurology in September 2008 as an instructor and was promoted to assistant professor in 2010. Her research spans Huntington’s Disease and glial biology, with active roles in UAB’s Comprehensive Neuroscience Center and the Killion Center for Neurodegeneration and Experimental Therapeutics.
Dr. Gray is a graduate of Alabama State University, where she majored in biology. She holds a Ph.D. in molecular biology from Ohio State University and completed postdoctoral training at the University of California, Los Angeles’ Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior.
Todd Craig is the new Marks Family Senior Director of the Marks Family Center for Excellence in Writing at the University of Pennsylvania. He comes to the Ivy League institution from the City University of New York Graduate Center, where he was an associate professor of urban education and of English. He also served as an associate professor of African American studies at New York City College of Technology. He is the author of the award-winning K for the Way: DJ Rhetoric and Literacy for 21st Century Writing Studies (Utah State University Press, 2023).
Dr. Craig earned his bachelor’s degree in sociology with a concentration in African American studies from Williams College in Massachusetts, now the top-ranked liberal arts college in the United States. He holds a master’s degree in learning and teaching from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education and a doctorate in English from St. John’s University in Queens, New York.
