News Release

A Note from the Director

As I reach the end of my first five year term as Director of the Institute on Aging, I want to highlight our developments over the past five years.

With leadership from Associate Director for Program Development, Mary Altpeter and Associate Director for Educational Development, Jim Mitchell, the Institute initiated, and has continued to support, the establishment of the North Carolina Gerontology Consortium, now promoting collaboration across ten campuses for distance education in gerontology. Professor Ed Rosenberg of Appalachian State has just completed the inaugural term as chair of the NCGC. Mary Altpeter and Danielle Borasky have secured numerous grants to support distance education courses for the Certificate in Aging Program on the Chapel Hill campus and for the Consortium.

Under Associate Director for Public Service Bill Lamb, the Institute assumed leadership of the Senior Leadership in Aging Program from Duke University; and having brought together many partners from across the state, he established and placed on a firm footing the very successful North Carolina Conference on Aging. As Bill and I both recognize, the success of the conference depends absolutely on the dedication and expertise in events management of Diane Wurzinger. Diane manages all events for the Institute, including our successful weekly seminar series, research meetings and symposia, and the Aging Exchange.

With several partners at UNC at Chapel Hill, the Institute initiated the Ageing Exchange as a means to showcase research, education and service activities on the Chapel Hill campus, and the great success of this event earlier this spring has led to a decision to conduct it annually.

The Institute attracted Dr. Peggye Dilworth-Anderson as Associate Director for Aging and Diversity and to direct a center with the same name; and her efforts, along with those of Research Scientist Sharon Williams, have generated a great deal of research and research training activity. Much of this is focused on understanding and enhancing caregiving in the case of Alzheimer's disease. The Institute also provides strong support through research opportunities and Peggye's mentoring to enhance our ability to attract capable minority fellows in our CPHAR program.

Danielle Borasky, was recruited as our librarian and, with Marlys Ray and Amy Funderburk in support established a highly acclaimed library and information center that also produces the Institute's newsletter and maintains its website. The information center directly supports the Institute's research programs at both developmental and operational stages, but in addition it provides a strong, dynamic contribution to education and service in aging, that benefits people across the state.

The Carolina Program in Healthcare and Aging Research was funded by NIA, initially spearheaded by Dr. Carol Hogue, and provides research training to doctoral and post-doctoral fellows, who help to make the Institute a lively place. Meanwhile, we continue to co-sponsor the Certificate in Aging Program with the School of Social Work, and we also support education by employing several graduate and undergraduate students as research assistants.

We are growing our research programs. The Healthy Aging Network was established, in partnership with the Program on Aging and with support from the CDC. Mary Altpeter leads the Institute's efforts through the HAN to promote healthy aging through a growing network across the state, and Becky Hunter, from the Program on Aging, and I round out the leadership for this effort.

The WIN A STEP UP project, a service program aimed at reducing nursing assistant turnover in long term care, led by Bob Konrad (IOA Senior Research Scientist), continues, and has won an award for its work.

We now have two active research projects, and more proposed, in the area of aging, work and retirement, viewed in a life course perspective. Jennifer Craft Morgan, Research Scientist, is project coordinator for the Workforce Aging in the New Economy Project (WANE), in addition to the scientific role she plays on it. Graduate research assistants Mairead Moloney and Kate Pepin provide in-house research assistance. Rebecca Matteo, another senior doctoral student on our staff works with me on a study of the economic life courses of veterans of the Canadian Armed Forces.

Under IOA manager Wendy Mann, the Institute has developed a highly effective administrative team for the development and management of research grant activities. The team, including Robin Burke, Diane Wurzinger, Cathy Hatley, Timica Harrelson and Betty Walters, has expertise in grants management, budgeting and events management. In developing proposals, investigators also find valuable inputs from the associate directors and research scientists of the Institute, who contribute consultatively to proposal development.

The above-listed activities do not give a full picture of the Institute's activities but perhaps are enough to suggest that a great deal of progress has been made in the Institute on Aging. What I hope you will all gather from this is the fact that this is a team effort. I am exceptionally proud, and exceptionally fond, of our staff within the Institute on Aging. Our work, however, takes us well outside the walls of the Institute. Almost everything we do involves partnerships: on the Chapel Hill Campus, with other universities in North Carolina or as far away as Melbourne Australia or Cambridge England, with the Division of Aging and Adult Services and other government agencies, and with service providers and aging advocacy organizations. We receive valuable guidance from a Statewide Advisory Council (chaired by Jim Mitchell), that brings academic, service, government and advocacy input to bear as we define our mission. I am also pleased to acknowledge the strong support from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, including advice, moral support and sometimes direct support from several other center and institute directors. Finally, I am grateful for the strong backing of Tony Waldrop, the Vice Chancellor for Research and Economic Development, to whom I currently report, and former Associate Provost Ned Brooks, who hired me and has been a great cheerleader for the Institute.

Those who work closely with me will have often heard me say, "Life is short, so as much as I can, I try to work only with nice and good people, people who also like to have fun." Its been a privilege for me to have been able to do so in the past five years and I look forward to the coming five years with a sense of energy, excitement, and continuing appreciation for everyone in the Institute and in relationships with us.

Victor Marshall, Director