SMPH Intranet
For the School of Medicine and Public Health Community

Welcome Chancellor Mnookin

We were so pleased to welcome Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin to the school on Monday, September 18, white laboratory coat and all, as an honorary learner and researcher.

We invite you to view photos and read more details about her visit, including time spent with health professions students, in the simulation center, touring research areas and even behind the microscope.

We are grateful to the chancellor, and to those who participated in the visit, for sharing our commitment to advancing health and health equity.

Photos: Todd Brown – Media Solutions
Man and woman happily greeting each other.
Ed Chapman, PhD, professor of neuroscience, presented Chancellor Mnookin with a personalized lab coat as a gift for visiting the school. The Chancellor visited his laboratory, which studies how nerve cells communicate with one another.
Group of people assembled around a table in conversation
Chancellor Mnookin met with the leaders of the school’s five health professions programs and heard a presentation from two medical students. Victoria Johnson (standing at left) presented her work with Wisconsin's Plain communities such as Amish, Old Order Mennonite, and German Baptist groups, as part of the school’s Wisconsin Academy for Rural Medicine.
Woman showing materials to another woman
During a stop at the school’s Wichman Clinical Teaching and Assessment Center, Chancellor Mnookin learned how its state-of-the-art educational technology and standardized patient program allows future healthcare professionals to hone their skills. Jenna Patenaude, MA, the center’s director, shows the chancellor learning materials and explains how recorded standardized patient visits are used as a teaching tool.
Featured is a clinical simulation setting, small group of people watch a woman look over a manikin
The UW Health Clinical Simulation Program is the school and health system’s cutting-edge simulation center that provides robust and realistic learning opportunities to prepare health care professionals for actual patient care situations. The center utilizes virtual reality, highly realistic manikins and other technologies to advance learning. Shannon DiMarco, MSHS, the center’s administrative director, showed Chancellor Mnookin a manikin used in training.
Group of individuals seated listening to a speaker
For a stop at the school’s Office of Multicultural Affairs and Native American Center for Health Professions, Chancellor Mnookin engaged with a diverse group of the school’s health professions students. The group discussed the student experience, including how the university can support first-generation students, and how a strong, diverse clinician workforce will be poised to advance the health of the people of Wisconsin and beyond and promote health equity.
With lab equipment in foreground, a small group holds a discussion in the background
The Chancellor’s tour of the school’s research enterprise began with the Cyclotron Laboratory in the Wisconsin Institutes for Medical Research (WIMR). Todd E. Barnhart, PhD, cyclotron director, shared with her how the lab produces radionuclides for use on campus and nationally, as well as researches more effective and efficient ways to produce them. Radionuclides are radioactive materials that are essential for medical diagnosis, disease treatment and fundamental scientific inquiry.
Women in red stands and listens to two individuals speak in front of research posters in hallway
Graduate students Kendall Barrett (left) and Aeli Olson (right) presented their research posters to the Chancellor as part of the Cyclotron Laboratory tour. The laboratory is housed in the Department of Medical Physics.
Woman looks at monitor, man assists in describing images
The school’s Optical Imaging Core is a shared core facility that offers imaging services on six modern microscopy systems. Chancellor Mnookin visited three microscopes and captured images. While visiting with graduate student Ziheng Zhang, she learned about his work investigating how cells move tiny molecular cargo and how errors in these processes can lead to neurodegenerative disease.
Chancellor Mnookin peering into a microscope
Under the guidance of postdoctoral fellow Emma Watson Roberts, PhD, Chancellor Mnookin peered into a confocal microscope. High-powered microscopes help researchers learn more about cellular processes.

Thank you to the school partner's who helped to make the Chancellor's visit so memorable.

Not pictured:

  • Students, faculty and research staff served as Chancellor Mnookin’s tour guides for the day. 
  • A tour of the Swine Level 1 Room and discussion with the animal care team illustrated the value and importance of animal models in research and patient care.