Terence D. Sanger, MD, PhD has been appointed to head the newly-formed educational leadership committee of the Health Sciences and Technology (HST) initiative that the Viterbi School is developing in partnership with the Keck School of Medicine.
His task: recruit 20 HST student prospects and buld an academic program for them.
Terrence Sanger, MD, PhD: "an ideal choice."
"I have been familiar with Terry's original research in the domain of Health Science Technology since we were both graduate students at M.I.T." said Viterbi School Senior Associate Dean for Research Maja Matarić. "I am glad Terry is now at USC and I am delighted that he is assuming this new task."
"Newly-recruited from Stanford, Dr. Sanger is an ideal choice to head HST educational program development," said Keck Schol Vice Dean for Research Elizabeth Fini. "He is jointly appointed between the Viterbi and Keck Schools. He serves as an Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Neurology. His NIH-funded research program spans the lab and the clinic, focusing on childhood movement disorders. Importantly, he is a graduate of the Harvard-MIT HST program, thus bringing a deep understanding of the HST concept and how it works."
Sanger, who has a PhD in Electrical Engineering from M.I.T. as well as a Harvard MD, will build on the groundwork laid by Martha Gray, a former director of the Harvard HST program, who was brought on in 2008 as a consultant for program development by Viterbi and Keck.
Over academic year 2008-2009, Dr. Gray conducted a series of meetings with faculty and administrators of the two schools in order to assess program potential. Program development was also implemented in two HST@USC retreats.
The first, held in October 2008, focused on research, cross-school networking, and research team formation. The second, held in May 2009, focused on educational programs. In addition, a networking event was held in October 2009 to encourage teaming for NIH challenge and other ARRA grant opportunities.
In the summer of 2009, the HST@USC executive committee (comprised of the deans and research deans, working with Dr. Gray) developed a white paper which laid out a roadmap for the program. In a meeting in September with the full steering committee, next steps were defined and implementation began.
In December 2009, the educational leadership committee that Sanger will chair was appointed. This committee will be responsible for developing a comprehensive curriculum that simultaneously addresses the educational needs of the graduate and medical students to be enrolled in the HST@USC program.
The goal is to enroll an entering cohort of 10 MD medical students and 10 PhD engineering students into the first HST flagship programs in medical and graduate education within the next one to two years.
Michael Khoo, PhD, Chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at VSoE and Allan Abbott, MD, Associate Dean for Medical Curriculum at KSOM, will work closely with Sanger in developing the HST@USC curriculum as members of the three person leadership committee.
