wfn.org | New center to train students for health care careers

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>]

Nov. 21, 2001 News media contact: Linda Green7(615)742-54707Nashville, Tenn.
10-31-71BP{547}

NOTE:  Photos are available for use with this story.

By Jane Dennis*

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (UMNS)- A partnership between a small, predominately black
college and a general agency of the United Methodist Church has the
potential of significantly improving health care in the Arkansas Delta and
around the world and expanding the college's emphasis on mission.

Representatives of United Methodist-related Philander Smith College and the
churchwide Board of Global Ministries broke ground Nov. 12 for the Harry R.
Kendall Science and Health Mission Center on the college campus. 

The new facility is being constructed with an $8 million grant from the
Harry R. Kendall Fund of the mission agency's health and welfare unit, the
largest gift ever awarded by the department.  Focus of the center's programs
will be health sciences education, congregational- and community-based
health ministries, and educational opportunities for international students.

Kendall was born to a Kentucky farm family in 1876 and began working in the
insurance industry at the age of 17. After a long career with Prudential, he
led Washington National Insurance Co., the first insurance agency to serve
the African-American community. When he died in 1958, he left the bulk of
his estate -- $12 million -- to a trust fund for charitable, religious and
educational institutions. 

The Kendall Foundation was established to prepare African-American students
for health professions to address critical needs within communities across
the nation.  One of the aims of the college's science and health mission
center is to educate low-income students from economically depressed regions
in the United States and developing countries who will covenant to return to
their homes to enhance indigenous health care systems. The Arkansas Delta is
one of the poorest economic regions in the nation.   

Calling it a "historic occasion," the Rev. Randolph Nugent, chief executive
at global ministries, praised the partnership of the 124-year-old college
and the churchwide agency. "This will be a facility which shall have an
impact on the world," he said. "This partnership is an important effort to
care for people in need. The work and love and commitment that will be
initiated here will have an effect that will be timeless." 

The drone of machines and construction workers erecting a new library and
technology center on the campus provided the backdrop for the outdoor
ceremony. "It's not often that you gather to break ground for one building
while another one is going up right behind you," said the Rev. Paul Dirdak,
chief executive of the board's health and relief unit,  "That's exciting." 

He said the new facility promises to be a "place where young people will be
prepared for careers in health services and where they will be trained using
the latest technology and equipment. They will be entering professions and
fields that need them immediately."

Philander Smith College President Trudie Kibbe Reed called the
groundbreaking a "great moment, a proud moment" and said the center will
make it possible for the college to bring more students from Haiti, Mexico,
Africa, the Arkansas Delta and other places around the world where health
care needs are great.  

The college -- which has nearly 850 students and 90 full-and part-time
faculty members --  has already developed partnership agreements with Heifer
Project International, Meharry Medical College, Black Community Developers,
and hospitals and mission sites in Haiti and Mexico. Underlying the entire
effort is involving and training people with "that missionary heart," said
the Rev. Maxine Allen, the college's chaplain.

The two-story, 42,000-square-foot building will contain a fully equipped
science research facility, laboratories and conference meeting space that
will accommodate large groups and training activities. The denomination's
Arkansas Area Ministries offices, as well as the office of Bishop Janice
Riggle Huie, will have a new home in the mission center as well. The
expected completion date is January 2004.

"The center will have a two-pronged focus," Allen said. "One focus is
education at the under-graduate level, and the other is education of
congregations and communities on mission and health-care issues." 

The Philander Smith mission center is only the second one of its kind in the
United States. The United Methodist Mission Center at Emory University and
Gammon Theological Seminary in Atlanta was the first.

"Every year for 45 years, the Board of Global Ministries has made small
community-based grants from the Harry Kendall Fund and we sent a lot of
young people to medical schools," Dirdak said. 

The Philander Smith development is "the first time we have created a
partnership with an educational institution for a large project," he said.
The effort not only complements the agency's mandate to address world health
issues, it will significantly strengthen the college's facilities for
training students in the sciences, Dirdak said. Even with the current
facilities, which need updating, the college has accrued a 90-percent
acceptance rate among its students who apply for medical school.

"We believe this new partnership will build on that great strength," Dirdak
said.

Among the Philander Smith graduates attending the Nov. 12 ceremonies were
United Methodist Bishop Jonathan D. Keaton of the Ohio East Area; former
Philander Smith College President Myer L. Titus of Colorado Springs, Colo.;
and Rev. William T. Carter of New York, director of The Advance for Christ
and His Church, the denomination's avenue for second-mile mission giving. 
# # #
*Dennis is director of communications for the Arkansas Area of the United
Methodist Church and editor of the Arkansas United Methodist newspaper.

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United Methodist News Service
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