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Lerner Professorship of the Practice

Bloomberg School of Public Health
Health, Behavior & Society

Established in 2014 by Helaine and Sidney Lerner

SIDNEY and HELAINE LERNER have been longtime friends of the Bloomberg School of Public Health. They are major supporters of the Center for a Livable Future and the Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing.

Helaine Lerner founded GRACE Communications Foundation to create awareness of the problems with our industrial food system and to foster collaboration between NGO, academic and philanthropic partners to find innovative solutions.

Sidney Lerner (deceased) was a retired advertising executive who pioneered the popular Meatless Monday and Healthy Monday campaigns at the Bloomberg School.

In November 2014, they established the Lerner Center for Public Health Promotion of which the Lerner Professor is director. The Center is committed to the development, evaluation, and dissemination of innovative and effective health promotion interventions that address key health issues, as well as health promotion and advocacy training activities for faculty and students.

 

 

Held by Tesfa Alexander

As managing director and in other leadership roles at MITRE, a non-profit that operates the Health Federally Funded Research and Development Center under the US Department of Health and Human Services, Dr. TESFA ALEXANDER has led research and development teams in solving complex problems for federal, state, local, and tribal public health organizations. In this role, he has contributed to expanding the NIH-CDC Health Knowledge Monitoring and Response System that monitors, disrupts, and corrects inaccurate health information. Dr. Alexander also led the launch of the CDC Clinical and Community Data Initiative to integrate clinical data and community resources to improve health surveillance, program planning, and health equity.

As director of the Division of Health Communications at the FDA Center for Tobacco Products, Dr. Alexander led in developing methods to understand how young people perceive and use newly marketed tobacco products. Incorporating insights from health communications, epidemiology, social and behavioral science, and data science, Dr. Alexander has developed innovative public education and marketing programs to inform FDA’s regulatory and policy decisions. He was instrumental in developing public announcements of new FDA initiatives to require graphic health warnings on cigarette packaging and to evaluate the health effects of menthol cigarettes.

Dr. Alexander has published 14 peer-reviewed articles and taught health communication at the University of Memphis from 2011 to 2018 and George Washington University from 2018 to 2022. He was co-investigator of a National Cancer Institute grant to identify effective communication methods across Hispanic ethnic groups to study tobacco marketing and use among youth and young adults.

Dr. Alexander earned a BA in writing and communication from the State University of New York at Potsdam, an MA in organizational communication from Emerson College, and a PhD in health communication from University of Memphis. He was a Health Communication Fellow at NCI.

Dr. Alexander’s deep expertise in health communications and federal health policy and practice qualify him well to advance the research and teaching mission of our School and the Department of Health Policy and Management.

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