New leadership role overseeing non-degree education
To the Harvard Chan community,
I’m delighted to announce that Rifat Atun, professor of global health systems, will join my senior leadership team as vice dean for non-degree education and innovation, effective July 1.
This is a new leadership role at the School. It reflects the tremendous importance I put on expanding our short and intensive courses, and custom executive and continuing education programs. This area holds great promise for developing new ways to deliver excellent, accessible, and highly relevant Harvard Chan training to public health professionals around the world. This work advances our mission in very meaningful ways and has the potential to bring in new revenue as well.
Rifat will build on the excellent work of John McDonough, professor of the practice of public health and director of Executive and Continuing Education (ECE). In his 13 years at the helm, John introduced ECE’s first online courses and expanded its programming to reach 2,500 learners from more than 60 nations each year. Under John’s leadership, ECE also launched important custom business programs for clients including the United Kingdom’s National Health Service, the U.S. Defense Health Agency, and the pharmaceutical company Merck. John will step down from ECE next week. He will remain on the faculty in the Department of Health Policy and Management, where he will continue to teach and mentor.
Rifat brings tremendous experience to his new role. He has designed and led executive education programs for leading global companies and served as an adviser to numerous governments, as well as to the World Bank and World Health Organization.
At Harvard Chan School, Rifat directs the Health Systems Innovation Lab, which has a stellar record in research, education—and, importantly, implementation. I believe that his experience designing, evaluating, incubating, and scaling creative solutions to real-world problems will serve Rifat well in his new position. He plans to work closely with our community to use our world-class research as the foundation for an expanded portfolio of non-degree programs, leveraging new learning technologies to reach students everywhere. This approach aligns well with my “Triple A” vision for a School that is agile, accessible, and accountable.
Please join me in welcoming Rifat as our new vice dean for non-degree education and innovation. Please also join me in thanking John for his dedicated service to ECE.
Best,
Andrea
Andrea Baccarelli, MD, PhD
Dean of the Faculty
