Curbing youth violence is focus of new Meharry initiative
By CLAUDIA PINTO
Staff Writer
Tuesday, 10/03/06

Meharry Medical College is launching a new program to develop strategies to combat youth violence with a $4.2 million federal grant, over five years.

Initiatives will include funding a bullying-prevention program in area middle schools and developing a youth-violence surveillance system, to better understand where crimes are occurring and who is committing them.

We have to find ways to stop the violence that is devouring the jewels of our future," said Valerie Montgomery Rice, Meharry's dean of the School of Medicine, said at a press conference today. "(This grant) is going to allow us to take back our children, embrace them, teach them, hold them, provide alternatives and empower them."

Meharry will work in collaboration with other universities, community-based organizations, and the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, among others.

The funding for the initiative comes from the CDC.

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Meharry Medical College is the nation’s largest private, independent historically black institution dedicated solely to educating minority and other health professionals. The College is particularly well known for its uniquely nurturing, highly effective educational programs; emerging preeminence in health disparities research; culturally sensitive, evidence-based health services; and significant contribution to the diversity of the nation’s health professions workforce. Black Issues in Higher Education’s ranking of institutions annually lists Meharry as a leading national educator of African Americans with M.D. and D.D.S. degrees, and Ph.D. degrees in the biomedical sciences.