The Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health is unique as the first academic Department to be co-developed and co-governed in partnership with the communities it serves. As Michigan State University's first fully philanthropically named Department, expansion efforts include recruiting top talent. With more than $186 million in federal research grants and other funding to date, this community-partnered public health department has been an economic engine for Flint while improving health outcomes and influencing health policy.
Based at the College of Human Medicine in Flint, the Department employs over 200 high-performing faculty and staff dedicated to implementation, intervention, and policy research. Its close ties to the Flint community enable faculty to gain insights into the community's strengths and needs, address its most urgent public health issues, and create solutions that work locally and nationally.
"At Michigan State, we work alongside members of the community to find and scale solutions that address their health concerns," said Jennifer E. Johnson, founding chair of the Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health. "This is what brought me to Flint, and this is what continues to inspire my work as a researcher and as the founding chair. I am excited that Dr. Amber Pearson will bring her expertise and passion to recruit the best research talent to Flint."
Pearson is an associate professor in the Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health and an adjunct fellow in the Department of Public Health at the University of Otago. She works as a health geographer and is a national leader in social justice and intersections between spatial and social features of neighborhoods. Her research relates to aspects of the neighborhood built, physical and social environment that may bolster opportunities for a healthy life, often in the face of socioeconomic adversity. Her overall research goal is to understand the interactions between humans and their neighborhoods to improve health and well-being while paying careful attention to health inequalities and environmental justice.
In 2024, she was selected to be 1 of 4 MSU faculty on the first National Nature Assessment (NNA1). The assessment will identify and take stock of U.S. ecosystems and the benefits they provide to the economy, health, climate, environmental justice, and national security. NNA1 will also assess how nature could change in the future and what that means. Pearson is an author of the "Health and Well-being" chapter.
She completed her PhD in Geography and MPH in Global Health at the University of Washington, an MSc at Western Washington University, and a BA at the University of North Texas. Prior to joining MSU, she was a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand and then a Research Fellow at the University of Otago.
In her expanded role as Associate Chair for Recruitment and Searches, Pearson's primary responsibilities include:
- Leading the department recruitment committee.
- Establishing the department faculty and academic staff search committee(s).
- Working with communications on an advertising strategy for department faculty positions.
- Creating an inviting, appealing, and effective recruitment and interview process for faculty candidates.
In her role as search chair for the tenure track and research faculty search committee, Pearson will:
- Meet with the search committee regularly to review new applicants and vote on existing applicants during the active phase of the search.
- Work with department scheduling staff to offer search committee interviews and subsequent all-day interviews.
- Communicate with candidates to orient them on the department and search process and to keep candidates apprised of the search process.
- Maintain search committee documentation.
- Oversee an effective, equitable, and inviting search process.
- Facilitate hiring of strong research faculty into tenure track positions.
The department will continue to work on the areas of focus established by the Flint Public Health Research Advisory Committee, including research on behavioral health, chronic disease management, and health behavior — all through a health equity lens.
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November 19, 2024
