Faculty/Staff Newsletter

As we celebrate Public Health Thank You Day (today), Dean Perry takes a moment to express her deep appreciation for all that you do to support our students and advance our mission. Your dedication to teaching, mentorship, research, and service continues to define our college and to strengthen the university’s standing as a national leader in access and opportunity. Thank you. Find out what some of our students are thankful for here.

George Mason debuts interdisciplinary program training leaders in health and technology. Applications now open for spring 2026.

WECARE 2.0, a digitally delivered health promotion program for Chinese American dementia caregivers, is easy to use for all literacy levels and increases social supports. An innovative assessment by first generation and PhD student Kang Shen highlights that self-report feedback and website activity are crucial for understanding the delivery of a digital intervention.

Congratulations to everyone celebrating 5, 10, 15, & 20-year anniversaries at George Mason. View all 5, 10, and 15-year honorees here.  View the 20-45- year honorees here. 

Note: This week's Green and Gold Day events recognized employees who hit service milestones on or before June 30, 2025. Learn more here. Starting in 2026, milestone recognition will follow a calendar year schedule, ensuring that all employees are celebrated in the same year they reach their milestone. Dates for the 2026 service award celebration will be announced in spring 2026. With this change, a "catch-up" ceremony will be held in March 2026 to ensure timely recognition for those who reached a 5-year milestone in 2025, rather than waiting until fall 2026. Contact awards@gmu.edu with questions

The Winter Graduation Degree Celebration is right around the corner, and the college is in need of volunteers to assist at the Degree Celebration. Our college’s Degree Celebration will be a joint event with CEC and take place on December 17 at 4 pm. Volunteers will be asked to arrive about 1 hour before the event.

We are looking for individuals who are willing to assist with check-in or serve as a Marshal.

The college requires a minimum of 1 volunteer from each department to assist with the event. If you are able to help, fill out this form and OSA will be in touch.

Congratulations to Panagiota Kitsantas (HAP) on her NIH project, “Comorbidities in Pregnant Women with Prenatal Alcohol Exposure and Adverse Birth Outcomes" and to Rebecca Sutter (Nursing) for her projects funded through the Opioid Abatement Authority with City of Manassas Park "Local MAP MAT" and with the City of Petersburg Community Corrections "Operation STOP!": 

Nuttal Women’s Health Foundation is requesting LOIs. They have several RFPs, including RFP: Franklin Factor (LOI due December 15) is seeking innovations and technologies that can be deployed in both clinical and research settings to provide continuous, real-time assessments of environmental exposures, physiological changes and biological responses. They are particularly interested in innovations that leverage biosensors, wearables and other devices to monitor critical physiological, environmental, hormonal and health-related parameters. They also strongly encourage platforms that enable rigorous, scalable biomarker discovery, particularly those that can identify non-invasive indicators of health and disease specific to the female body. RFP: D³  (LOI due December 15) D³:Drivers, Diagnostics and Drug Development in Endometriosis. RFP: XXcelerate (rolling LOI submission) by funding existing and/or on-going clinical research that rigorously examines outcomes in women.

In addition, Klingenstein Philanthropies has an RFA on Transformation of Mental Health Care for young people. Applications are due December 15. Learn more here.

Two exciting initiatives to support research are underway: 1) George Mason is creating a Private Grant Repository of Successful Applications. To donate a funded proposal, please contact lfrieden@gmu.edu. 2) Do you conduct research in AI? Starting January, George Mason plans to stand up Microsoft Azure instances with a wide range of computational resources (number of CPU cores, memory, etc.) including PII/HIPAA compliant large language models. Reach out to aevanscu@gmu.edu if you have questions.

The recording from the Dean’s Speaker Series with Dr. Matthias von Schwanenflügel from the University of Bremen and the Institute for European Health and Social Economy is now available here. Thank you to everyone who attended in-person and online to learn about and discuss health care policy for older adults across Germany, the EU, and the WHO, along with reflections on emerging developments in the United States. 

The Stearns Center invites teams from all departments, programs, colleges, and schools at George Mason University, including full-time and part-time faculty, to submit a proposal for our Curriculum and Teaching Leadership Funds (CTL Funds): Extended Projects. We solicit proposals from teams of faculty involved in a high-impact teaching and learning project. Faculty may not apply for multiple Stearns Center funding opportunities in the same academic term. 

Apply for January Course ReDesign Academy. Course ReDesign Academy (CRA) will be mostly online in January—with Zoom meetings January 8-9, 2026—to support your final adjustments for a spring course or your advance planning for summer or fall. Accepted participants receive a stipend to support significant course development. Find more information on our CRA webpage and find our link to submit your application before December 12 on the "Upcoming Course Redesign Academies" sub-webpage. 

Mason Online is pleased to introduce their revised Online Quality Checklists. These are practical, evidence-based tools to support excellence in online teaching and learning. Use them to design, evaluate, and enhance your courses with proven standards and best practices that elevate online instruction and student engagement. 

If your grant process feels rushed, reactive, or more stressful than it should be, you are not alone. The new NCFDD blog, “How to Know If You’re Ready for a Grant Strategy Overhaul,” explains the common signs that your current approach may no longer fit the demands of today’s funding landscape.

 Here are a few insights you might recognize:

Read the blog: How to Know If You’re Ready for a Grant Strategy Overhaul

Do you receive the NCFDD Monday Motivator in your inbox? If not, subscribe here. Here is some information from last week’s NCFDD Motivator:

5 Secrets to Jumpstart Your Productivity

Each term, NCFDD offers a free training on the five secrets to a super productive semester. Remember that George Mason is a member of NCFDD, so individual faculty just need to go to the website and set up an account.

Which of these five "secrets" to a productive semester would give you the biggest boost?

Secret #1: Creating a Plan: Actually making a strategic plan and holding a 30-minute weekly planning meeting

Secret #2: Daily Writing: Committing to the habit of writing every single day for at least 30 minutes, no matter what

Secret #3: A Supportive Community: Finding a group where you can get real about your writing fears and anxieties 

Secret #4: Regular Accountability: Creating a real accountability structure for your writing so it doesn't get pushed by teaching and service

Secret #5: Dedicated Mentors: Finding a mentor who can act as a coach and help you get unstuck

PART OF THE MSW PROGRAM’S HUMAN RIGHTS SPEAKER SERIES

December 1 | Various events, see below | Peterson Hall

The AIDS crisis is not over. According to the World Health Organization, more than one million people acquired HIV in 2024 alone. By sharing the story of HIV, we make strides toward ensuring that future communities will not be harmed by fear, silence, discrimination, or stigma.

Join the Master of Social Work program to celebrate World AIDS Day. Learn more.

10:15 am - Opening Ceremony
Welcome with Melissa Perry. Unveiling of National AIDS Memorial Quilt. 

12 pm - Resource Fair

4:15 pm - Learn Share and Discuss
Welcome by Emily Ihara

5:30 pm - Candlelight Vigil 

Lead Organizers: Evelyn Tomaszewski, Li-Mei Chen, Arielle Gradney (MSW student), Jaden Ganjriz (MSW student)

December 2 | 11 am - 12 pm | Peterson 2000 | Lunch to follow | RSVP 

Health psychologist Dr. David Huebner from the George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health will share a high-level framework and practical strategies to improve LGBTQ health in our communities. See this flyer for more information, or view the event on Mason360.

December 11 | 9:30 am–3:45 pm | Mason Square | Register

Join the Department of Health Administration and Policy for a one-day symposium featuring experts from George Mason University, the German Embassy, the University of Bremen, and more.

Learn about innovative solutions to strengthen the long-term care workforce through policy, training, technology, and global collaboration.

December 16 | 4 - 6 pm | The HUB, Corner Pocket

Celebrate the end of the semester. Details and RSVP to come.

January 7 & 8 | Register here

Faculty can register now for the University’s Faculty Writing Retreat running  January 7 and 8. This retreat will be hosted both in-person and online. For those who participate in-person, free lunch and snacks will be provided on both days.

The retreat offers an approach for uninterrupted writing time and a supportive and collegial community of peers to boost your writing productivity. Participants work on a variety of research and creative projects at all stages of completion. Faculty members who have participated in past retreats report that they are very helpful in completing writing tasks, both large and small.

Saturday, January 10 | online only | Registration is required

Sessions are focused on teaching, student success, and relevant policies and resources. If you are a CPH adjunct faculty member, please attend if you are able.

Now through December 15

Support students facing food insecurity this holiday season by donating non-perishable food and hygiene items to marked drop-off boxes in all CPH department suites or by contributing online. Someone from the HAP department will stop by every Friday to pick up items.

MOST NEEDED ITEMS
Food: Pasta, rice, canned tuna/chicken, soups, mac & cheese, vegetables, snacks, peanut butter, cereal, instant oatmeal, vegetarian/vegan options. 
Hygiene: Body wash, shampoo, conditioner, deodorant, lotion, toothpaste, period products, razors, laundry detergent, paper towels, toilet paper.

Plan ahead, Steppers! This is the final week to “kick it in” for your unit: The last week of walking will be the week of Thanksgiving. The last reporting date will be December 1, which is our first day back after Thanksgiving. Don’t miss it!

HAP takes the lead this week, but Nutrition & Food Studies is close behind. T Rebmann was top individual stepper again last week.

Reporting for November 17-23 is due today by 11:59 pm. All CPH employees can join in—this includes adjuncts, GRAs, and wage staff. Report your preceding week’s steps here.

February 9, 2026 | Rebecca Winthrop, Senior Fellow and Co-Director, Center for Universal Education, The Brookings Institution and lead of the Brookings Global Task Force on AI in Education

 March 16, 2026 | Claudio Battiloro, Harvard University Biostatistics

PUBLICHEALTH.GMU.EDU

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