Accolades
Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges
The Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges honored the 2013 recipients of several awards March 6-10 at its Annual Conference in Alexandria, Va.
Dr. James R. Coffman (KSU ’62), former dean of Kansas State University College of Veterinary Medicine, was chosen to deliver the Recognition Lecture.
Dr. Coffman spoke about the convergence of influences shaping academic veterinary medicine, including the decline in state assistance to public universities, high expectations for outside research funds, the high cost of in-house clinical education, the impact of these factors on high tuition cost, and possible solutions to the pressures of these interconnected forces.
Dr. Coffman served as professor of equine medicine at the University of Missouri-Columbia from 1971-1981 before heading to KSU as the head of the Department of Surgery and Medicine. He served as dean of the KSU veterinary college from 1984-1987 and university provost from 1987-2004. In 2009, he retired from KSU, where the James R. Coffman Leadership Institute was established and named in his honor.
Dr. Coffman is a charter diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine and served as its president and chair of the board of regents. He has served as president of the American Association of Equine Practitioners and as a trustee of the AVMA’s PLIT, including two years as chairman of the board of trustees. He currently chairs the AVMA Task Force on Foreign Veterinary School Accreditation.
Dr. Will Hueston (OSU '80) received the Senator John Melcher DVM Leadership in Public Policy Award.
Dr. Hueston holds a joint professorship at the University of Minnesota College of Veterinary Medicine and the School of Public Health. In 2001, he created the university’s Center for Animal Health and Food Safety, which he led for seven years before being named executive director of the Global Initiative for Food Systems Leadership at UMN.
Last year, the Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture awarded UMN funding for its Food Policy Research Center, of which Dr. Hueston is the director and principal investigator. A critical component of the grant is the center’s education program, which includes veterinary faculty providing practical training in policy analysis that integrates biological, public health, environmental, and economic perspectives.
Dr. Hueston also serves as director of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) Collaborating Center for Veterinary Services Capacity Building. The center’s focus is on strengthening the veterinary capacity of countries to control the spread of zoonoses to facilitate global trade of animals and animal products.
Prior to joining the UMN faculty, Dr. Hueston held academic appointments at The Ohio State University, Colorado State University, and Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine.
Dr. James G. Fox (COL ’68) was awarded the Excellence in Research Award.
Dr. Fox directs the Division of Comparative Medicine in the Department of Biological Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is an adjunct professor at the veterinary schools at Tufts University and the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Fox is a past president of the Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges, American College of Laboratory Animal Medicine, and Massachusetts Society for Medical Research. He is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.
He is also a member of various other organizations, including the American Association for Laboratory Animal Science, AVMA, and American Society for Microbiology. He is an elected fellow of the Infectious Diseases Society of America.
He has been studying infectious diseases of the gastrointestinal tract for the past 35 years and is considered an international authority on the epidemiology and pathogenesis of enterohepatic Helicobacter species in humans and animals.
Dr. Ronnie G. Elmore (IL ’72) was honored with the 2013 Iverson Bell Recognition Award for his contributions to advancing inclusion and diversity in academic veterinary medicine.
He created an elective course at KSU, “Practicing Veterinary Medicine in a Multicultural Society,” which is designed to help students develop an awareness and appreciation of diversity, to communicate effectively with those from cultures different from their own. Dr. Elmore is also an in-demand speaker on diversity topics, and many credit him with raising awareness of the need to address a lack of diversity in the veterinary profession.
He has served as the associate dean for admissions and diversity programs at KSU’s veterinary college for more than 20 years.