Daniel L. Howard, Ph.D., Executive Director

Dr. Daniel L. Howard is executive director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Center for Health Policy at Meharry Medical College and a professor of health policy in the School of Graduate Studies and Research.  Dr. Howard received his bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Michigan College of Literature, Sciences, and Arts in 1987 and his Ph.D. in education and human development specializing in policy development and program evaluation at Vanderbilt University Peabody College of Education and Human Development in 1992.  His graduate work was funded by the Dorothy Danforth Compton Fellowship Award, 1987-1991.  He also received a Dissertation Fellowship Award from the Social Science Research Council Program on the Urban Underclass in 1991-1992.

Dr. Howard completed two years of postdoctoral training at the University of Michigan School of Public Health and School of Social Work as a Paul Cornely and Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Scholar in 1994.  He also completed two years of postdoctoral training at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH) Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research (Sheps Center) as a Health Services Research Postdoctoral Fellow funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) National Research Service Award in 1998.  He has been appointed as a Research Fellow (2002-2009) and as a Senior Research Fellow (2009-2014) at the UNC-CH Sheps Center.

Dr. Howard’s research interests include the examination of epidemiologic patterns of health outcomes that disproportionately affect African Americans; minority health and health disparities; health services and health policy.  He has numerous scientific, peer-reviewed manuscripts in prominent journals such as Academic Medicine, African American Research Perspectives, American Journal of Health Studies, American Journal of Men’s Health, American Journal of Obstetrics/Gynecology, American Journal of Public Health, Cancer Causes Control, Family Medicine, Harvard Health Policy Review, Health and Social Work, Health Services Research, Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, Humbolt Journal of Social Relations, Journal of Aging and Health, Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, Journal of the Black Nurses Association, Journal of Community Health, Journal of Cultural Diversity: An Interdisciplinary Journal, Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics, Journal of Health Disparities Research and Practice, Journal of the Medical Library Association, Journal of the National Medical Association, Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, Journal of Substance Abuse, Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, Journal of Women and Aging, Medical Care, Nursing Research, Public Health Reports, Progress in Community Health Partnerships: Research Education and Action, Public Health Reports, Research on Aging, Review of Black Political Economy and Substance Use and Misuse.

Dr. Howard has actively participated as a principal investigator, co-principal investigator and co-investigator on grant research funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NCMHD), National Center for Research Resources (NCRR), National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), National Institute on Aging (NIA),  Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the United States Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS),  Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, (AHRQ) and the United States Department of Defense (DoD), all of which pertain to health services, minority health and racial health disparities research.  He has received grant awards totaling over $25 million dollars.

Dr. Howard is a founding member of the executive committee for the Academy for Health Equity, an association of academicians, researchers, clinicians and other health professionals dedicated to the elimination of health disparities through the intellectual and collaborative exchange of research, policy and medical and public health interventions.  In 2009, he was invited to serve on the Wake County (Raleigh, North Carolina) Human Services Health Disparities Task Force.  In 2008, he was invited to serve on the editorial boards of the journals, Healthy Aging and Clinical Care in the Elderly as well as Risk Management and Healthcare Policy.  In 2007, he was invited to serve on the external advisory board of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Hopkins Center for Health Disparities Solutions, funded by the NIH NCMHD Centers of Excellence program, 2007- 2012.  He also was invited to serve on, and elected chairman of, the external advisory board of the Winston-Salem State University Center of Excellence for the Elimination of Health Disparities, funded by the NIH NCMHD Centers of Excellence program, 2007- 2012.  Finally, in 2007, he was invited to serve on the editorial board of the Journal of Multidisciplinary Healthcare.

In 2006, he received the National Role Model Researcher Award from Minority Access, Inc., a 501(c) (3) non-profit organization with a cooperative agreement with the U.S. DHHS to increase the pool of minority biomedical researchers by identifying individual and institutional role models.  In 2003, he founded the Institute for Health, Social and Community Research (IHSCR) at Shaw University, a national organization dedicated to the multidisciplinary empirical investigation of diverse issues that affect the health and well-being of minorities, particularly African Americans, their families and the communities in which they live, www.ihscr.org.  In 2001, he received the Historically Black College and University Spotlight on Excellence Administrator/Faculty Award from Black Voices Quarterly Magazine (www.blackvoices.com) and General Motors Corporation.

In 2002, Shaw University, with Dr. Howard as principal investigator, was the only university in the nation to attain two of the three NIH NCMHD Centers of Excellence program funding mechanisms (P60 and R24).  The Centers of Excellence were established to develop novel programs across America, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands that would make significant advances and contributions to easing the health burden in underserved populations and in reducing, and ultimately eliminating, health disparities in several priority diseases and conditions (www.ncmhd.nih.gov).  It was noted by the 2004 P60 external scientific program advisory committee of national experts that the “UNC-CH-Shaw Partnership should be viewed as the ‘showcase’ model for addressing health disparities.”  In 2007, Shaw University, with Dr. Howard as principal investigator, was the only university in the nation to partner with two NIH NCMHD P60 Centers of Excellence Research I Level Universities (UNC-CH and Johns Hopkins University).

On December 5, 2008, the IHSCR faculty and research staff moved into its new $5.4 million, 30,400 square foot research facility on Shaw University’s campus which was initiated and facilitated by Dr. Howard’s research infrastructure improvement grant.