Four new funds support Rollins' mission

In this competitive environment, funds are a crucial tool in recruiting the most promising students and retaining great faculty and staff. Rollins is grateful for the generous endowment of four new funds.

Ray Bain 81G and his wife, Marlene Cole, have endowed the Marlene N. Cole DVM, MPH and Raymond P. Bain PhD Scholarship in honor of Michael H. Kutner, professor of biostatistics and bioinformatics. The fund will support outstanding PhD students in biostatistics.

Bain is senior vice president of Biostatistics and Research Decision Sciences at Merck Research Laboratories. He earned his PhD in statistics and biometry at Emory School of Medicine, the precursor of the Rollins Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics. He then taught for five years as assistant professor of biometry, medicine, and community health. It was here he met Cole, a faculty member working in the medical school supervising the clinical care in animal modeling studies. Bain was assigned as the biostatistician on one of Cole’s studies. They left Emory in 1986, Cole to go to the National Institutes of Health and Bain to go to George Washington University. But they both remained close to Emory.

“Our philanthropic support is centered on education, and I particularly want to honor my mentors,” says Bain. “I’ve had several outstanding mentors, but the most spectacular, by far, was Mike Kutner.”

Joan Cioffi PhD has endowed the Joan P. Cioffi, PhD and Charles P. Freitas, Jr. Scholarship Endowment in honor of her late husband to provide scholarship support to outstanding MPH students with a preference for students who have a demonstrated interest in humanitarian response or public health services for displaced populations.

Cioffi dates her relationship with Rollins back to the 1980s, when she and Kathy Miner, emeritus associate dean for Applied Public Health, were both working toward advanced degrees at Georgia State University. Cioffi went on to work as director of education, training, and public relations for Emory University Hospital and then as a senior public health manager at the CDC, all the while maintaining her relationship with Miner and the program that would grow into RSPH.

Cioffi’s husband, who passed away more than a decade ago, worked across the globe as an engineer and was keenly aware of public health needs in the countries where he worked. “I am 75 years old, and I am looking for a legacy opportunity,” says Cioffi. “I’ve had a long-term relationship with Emory and with the public health program. I know a fund that helps attract the brightest students would be good for Atlanta, good for public health, and in a small way, would keep my husband’s memory alive.”

Cari Jo Clark, associate professor of global health, has endowed two funds, the Cari J. Clark Global Scholarship and the Cari J. Clark Global Women’s Health Fund. The former will support international students pursuing their MPH and the latter will support students, faculty, or staff working on global health research programs related to women’s health.

“Many scholarships are restricted to U.S. citizens, but I believe if the best and the brightest from around the world want to come to Rollins, they should be able to,” says Clark. “Also, it’s very hard to find money to support students, staff, and public health associates in women’s global health research.”

Clark decided to make the gifts after she received an inheritance from her grandparents. “My husband (Alvaro Alonso, associate professor of epidemiology) and I are both lucky enough to work at Emory, and we don’t have very big needs,” says Clark. “We wanted to put some of this money we inherited where our values are, so Rollins made sense for us.”