We are just past Labor Day which, in my mind, is the end of summer and the informal start of the academic year. Of course, like many things in 2020, this Labor Day milestone was "different" since when we came back on Tuesday we were dealing with hurricane force winds, downed trees and power outages! A number of our teams were both professionally and personally affected by the storm’s winds, but in our now normal manner, everyone has shown a tremendous amount of resilience and can-do spirit. As a sign of the academic year restarting, Pediatric Grand Rounds are back but virtual (on You-Tube), and our Research In Progress presentations are ramping up as well but are still virtual (on Zoom). We also got an encouraging perspective from Intermountain CEO, Dr. Marc Harrison, who highlighted in a recent op-ed how we are making slow but steady progress in managing the pandemic in our Utah community. Many of you know that Dr. Harrison trained here at the U and Primary Children’s and completed a Critical Care fellowship in the 1990s. Here are a some of the data that Dr. Harrison points us to and a few of his comments: 

H. Joseph Yost, PhD is the 2020 recipient of the Gary C. Schoenwolf Mentorship Award. The Schoenwolf award, established in 2009, celebrates pediatric faculty members who embody the spirit of mentorship. This prestigious award acknowledges the time, sacrifice, and commitment of mentors who enable junior colleagues to achieve their academic potential in clinical, research, and teaching activities. Award recipients are recognized for their sustained career commitment to mentoring, their positive impact on their mentees’ careers and, through the efforts of their mentees, advancing research and patient care. 

Dr. Joe Yost is the Principal Investigator (PI) of a well-respected lab on campus, aptly named the Yost Lab, which has successfully trained 30 undergraduates, 10 PhD or MD/PhD students, and 30 postdoctoral fellows or Pediatrics junior faculty. His former trainees are currently leaders of their own research teams as tenured or tenured-track faculty or pursuing successful careers in biotech, medicine or related fields.

In addition to his lab, Dr. Yost is the Principal Investigator of the NIH T32 training grant in Developmental Biology, a longstanding program that provides fellowships for predoctoral and postdoctoral trainees. This program provides financial support as well as leverages the strengths of the University’s developmental biology community through creating professional relationships and offering an opportunity to be mentored by many PIs. Similarly, Dr. Yost is the Training Director for the American Heart Association Strategically Focused Research Network, which involves a multidisciplinary team conducting collaborative research to prevent and treat congenital heart disease. His roles in both of these programs demonstrate his commitment to training beyond those in his lab and to facilitating professional development through collaboration.

Dr. Yost has also had significant involvement in Department of Pediatrics programs housed in the Research Education Office that impact K-12 and undergraduate students, specifically BioEYES, the Native American Summer Research Internship (NARI), and the Genomics Summer Research for Minorities (GSRM) internship. Dr. Yost was instrumental in starting the Utah Chapter of BioEYES, a program that exposes K-12 students to science exploration through the use of hands-on zebra fish experiments and trains public school teachers in science education. Dr. Yost has served as a mentor to four NARI participants since the program's inception. And finally, Dr. Yost is the PI for the GSRM program which trains a cadre of minority scholars by offering mentorship, research experience, and professional development opportunities in order to create a pathway to increase diversity in science research.

Please join us in congratulating Dr. Joe Yost on this distinguished award!

 4th Year Reappointment actions for Career-Line faculty will be voted on through an MBM eVote. Faculty, please watch your inbox for the eVote invitation on Friday, September 11. The ballot will be open for one week. Faculty from all ranks on the Tenure and Career-line tracks are eligible to vote on reappointment actions.

Meeting 1 of 2: Monday, September 21

Meeting 2 of 2: Tuesday, September 29

Time: 5:00 – 7:00 p.m.

Applications for Fall Staff Council scholarships are due September 15. Qualified applicants must be employed at the U for a minimum of 2 years, work at .75 FTE or greater, and not received a Staff Council scholarship within the past 2 years. Two scholarships are available:

This is a department-wide call to join a new multidisciplinary PCH Work Group to

reduce disparities in care, with the following aims:

Our first group Zoom meeting will be held on September 23rd from 12-1 p.m. Please register ahead of time.

If you are unable to join the meeting on September 23, but would like to be part of

this group, please email Reena.Tam@hsc.utah.edu or Katie.Gradick@hsc.utah.edu

The office of Health Equity, Diversity, & Inclusion is creating a platform for working groups that will foster togetherness, community, and activism for underrepresented faculty and staff. The purpose of the affinity groups are to:

If you are interested in becoming part of starting these groups on our campus, please fill out a short survey found here.

If you missed Dr. Angelo Giardino's grand rounds presentation, "The Pediatric Leadership Challenge: Clock-builders vs. Time-tellers," you can view a recording of the meeting here.

Recognitions will be published in an upcoming issue of the newsletter. Please note: if a submitter's name is not given, we will not publish the comment. However, the submitter's name will remain anonymous in the newsletter.

Lindsay Browning – Administrative Program Coordinator, Allergy/Immunology, Nephrology, and Rheumatology

"Lindsay is always willing to help and does so with a great attitude. She makes the workplace more cheerful and pleasant. She is wonderful to work with!!!!"

Katelyn Kartes – Resident, Pediatrics

"Katelyn was an amazing senior on Osborn. Her positivity was contagious and she created a psychologically safe place for me to stumble through my first intern wards rotation. She fluidly and effortlessly builds rapport with families and is a great role model for patient-centered care."

Joanna Rodriguez – Medical Assistant, Clinical Enterprise

"Joanna went into Zen mode for an adolescent with cerebral palsy, pain and anxiety as she assisted with injections of botulinum toxin to reduce spasms. The child was scared, tense and uncomfortable as we positioned her for the procedure. Joanna hopped onto the mat table, eased the patient into the optimal position, and then talked her through some deep breathing exercises. Everyone in the room was relaxed and calm, it was a clear demonstration of kindness, compassion and true pediatric caregiving. We are fortunate to have Joanna on our pediatric team."

As the authors explain, "microaggressions commonly occur in medical settings creating psychologically unsafe environments of learning, working, and healing. Learners, educators, and patients can receive, inflict, or witness subtle acts of discrimination." Although this article is geared toward helping clinician-educators recognize and address microaggressions towards their learners, all department members can benefit from learning to recognize when someone is on the receiving end of a microaggression, ways that we can confront the microaggressions we witness, and what we can do to mitigate some of the negative impact a microaggression may have caused. Read the article here (7 min).