Not all public health researchers are fortunate enough to help build an academic department from the ground up, let alone have the full backing and partnership of community members along the way. But Jennifer Johnson is among those lucky few. At Michigan State University, she's part of a public health department that is fast becoming a national model for community-based participatory research and implementation that’s making a profound impact on the health of Michigan residents.

Johnson is the first Charles Stewart Mott Endowed Professor of Public Health at the Flint campus of MSU’s College of Human Medicine and the inaugural chair of the Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health. There, she leads nearly 200 faculty and staff working to implement evidence-based practices to improve health and well-being. 

“My story is interwoven with the department story,” says Johnson, who lives and works in the city. “I left an Ivy League university to come to Flint as the first faculty member here because I'd never seen a university build a whole academic department in partnership with a community.”

In 2014, Johnson had just gone through an unconventional interview process in Flint for MSU’s burgeoning public health department. She was anticipating the usual — and in her words “dry and predictable” — process. In Flint, however, the College of Human Medicine team brought community members to the interview. They asked Johnson questions and provided feedback. It was clear to Johnson that the university was working in partnership with the community to build this department.

Sitting in the airport after the interview process and reflecting, she thought to herself, “Oh my goodness, I’m coming to Flint.” Nearly a decade later, the Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health is thriving. And Johnson is thriving too, attracting the sixth highest funding in the country from the National Institutes of Health for public health research. 

Whether working to improve mental health, suicide prevention or maternal health care, Johnson and her colleagues put community members and their needs first. And the work that begins in Flint often reaches throughout the state and across the country.

Johnson points to her research addressing why African American and Black women die at higher rates during childbirth. She and her colleagues are training hundreds of providers across 20 Michigan counties on best practices to ensure these populations have outcomes that are as good as those of other patients.

The partnership between Flint and MSU, Johnson believes, is what makes the department’s work so effective — by giving the community a voice in what happens both in research and clinical care.

“What better place could there be to make a change in the world,” Johnson says, “than Flint and MSU?”

Originally published in MSU Today on August 21, 2024