Lyceum Speaker Series
The Office of Diversity and Inclusion’s Lyceum Speaker Series hosts distinguished scholars to present on current topics related to diversity and inclusion. These events are open to everyone, with the goal of encouraging inclusivity, learning, and understanding throughout the Feinberg community.
Previous Lyceum Speakers
Fall 2022: The Emergency: A Year of Healing and Heartbreak in a Chicago ER
Thomas Fisher is a board-certified emergency medicine physician at The University of Chicago and a Venture Chair at Redesign Health. The Author of The Emergency: A year of healing and heartbreak in a Chicago ER, he brings readers into the clinical setting to reveal how society and healthcare shape our bodies causing unnecessary suffering. For more than twenty years he has been an ED physician, serving the same South Side Chicago community where he was raised.Spring 2022: Challenges in Cancer Care for Sexual and Gender Minorities
Ulrike Boehmer, PhD, Adjunct Associate Professor, Community Health Sciencesat Boston University School of Public Health shared her research investigating differences in quality of life, cancer prevalence, cancer mortality, and health-related decision-making while examining disparities due to sexual orientation, gender, race, ethnicity and socioeconomic status. Boehmer is recognized as a leader in LGBT health, especially in the context of cancer, and she is an associate editor of the journal LGBT Health.
Winter 2019: Understanding the Clinician Role in the Resolution of Health Inequities – Black Maternal Health as an Exemplar
Monica McLemore, RN, PhD, FAAN, Associate Professor in the Family Health Care Nursing Department at the University of California, San Francisco, shared perspectives on understanding the clinician role in the resolution of health inequities, using black maternal health as an exemplar. McLemore presented evidence and created a sense of urgency for healthcare providers to address the disconnect between what patients want and need and what the current healthcare system provides.
Spring 2019: Disabusing Disability
Oluwaferanmi Okanlami, MD, MS, Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and director for medical student success in the Office for Health Equity and Inclusion at the University of Michigan, emphasized that disability doesn’t mean inability and promoted a health system that is more inclusive and accessible for all.
Fall 2017: The Price of Recognition: Race and the Making of the Modern University
Jonathan Holloway, PhD, president-elect of Rutgers University, and former provost of Northwestern University, provided a historical overview of African-Americans in majority white universities during his address, but he also spoke personally of progress and his optimism for the future.
Spring 2017: Language Concordant Care: Quality and Safety
Monica Vela, MD, professor of Medicine and associate dean of multicultural affairs at the University of Chicago’s Pritzker School of Medicine. She engaged the audience in a lively discussion about common language proficiency challenges and opportunities in clinical settings.
Fall 2016: Health Disparities in the US
Antonia Novello, MD, U.S. Surgeon General from 1990-1993. Dr. Novello was the first woman and the first Hispanic to hold this office. During her tenure she was an outspoken champion of diversity and inclusion.
Spring 2016: Wrong Place Wrong Time: Seeing Violence Through the Lens of Trauma
John A. Rich, MD, MPH, MacArthur fellow and professor of health management and policy at the Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice at Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health, discussed violence through the lens of trauma in young, urban African American men.
