We are excited to announce that Jen Murray, a PhD candidate, and Alison Head, an MPH student, have been awarded the Bill Meekison Memorial Scholarship in Public Health this year. Congratulations to both of them!
Jennifer Murray
Jennifer Murray is a PhD candidate, and she is investigating a high rate of preterm birth among Quw’utsun (Cowichan) people. To conduct this research, Jennifer is using community-based research methods in partnership with Cowichan Tribes, a First Nations community whose traditional territory is located on southern Vancouver Island, British Columbia (BC). Her UBC supervisory committee includes Dr. Patricia Janssen (primary supervisor), Dr. Jennifer Leason (co-supervisor), Quw’utsun Elder Doreen Peter, and Dr. Devon Greyson. Jennifer is a fourth-generation White settler and resides on the traditional territory of the W̱SÁNEĆ People (also known as Victoria, BC).
Alison Head
Alison Head’s interest in public health has been shaped by her experience as a Registered Nurse, which includes her work on the frontline of the COVID-19 pandemic and in the neonatal intensive care unit at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Ontario. She is passionate about maternal-child health and health equity, and her professional interests include epidemiology, biostatistics, health promotion, and program planning and evaluation. She is eager to apply what she has learned in the MPH program to advance public health initiatives that promote healthy pregnancies and positive birth outcomes so that fewer families require specialized care. The Bill Meekison Memorial Scholarship will support Alison in further developing the knowledge and skills necessary to effectively address such pressing challenges in public health.
About the Bill Meekison Memorial Scholarship in Public Health
Scholarships totalling $5,350 have been made available through an endowment established by friends and family in memory of Bill Meekison (1934-2019) for outstanding M.P.H. and Ph.D. students in the School of Population and Public Health who are researching public health. Bill (B.A. 1957, M.D. 1962, M.P.H.) obtained his Master of Public Health from the University of Toronto after graduating from UBC, and began his career as a public health officer in Williams Lake, British Columbia. He later served as Director of the Boundary Health Unit in the Lower Mainland, during which he prohibited a bar from serving drinks with a frost-bitten toe in them, an incident chronicled by one newspaper under the headline “Dr. Bill Says Toe Must Go”. Bill was an advocate for preventative medicine and public health, advising on vaccine clinical trails for the chicken pox vaccine and serving as a Director for the New Westminster-based Affordable Housing Societies. The scholarships are made on the recommendation of the School of Population and Public Health, in consultation with the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies.
Last year: https://spph.ubc.ca/two-spph-students-awarded-bill-meekison-memorial-scholarship-in-public-health/