Jeffrey Lehman offers global vision for health care

New York, NY (October 14, 2003) -- As part of an historic "triple inauguration," Jeffrey S. Lehman will be inaugurated as president of Cornell University at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City on Wednesday, October 15. This follows inaugural ceremonies at the Weill Cornell Medical College in Doha, Qatar, and precedes ceremonies at Cornell's main campus in Ithaca. The New York City ceremonies feature an inaugural address articulating President Lehman's global vision for Cornell and higher education, and a presentation by international AIDS leader Dr. Anthony Fauci on urgent current challenges to global health. Reflecting his global vision, Lehman is probably the first university president to be inaugurated both within and beyond national borders.

"Cornell Celebrates a New Beginning" is the theme of the inauguration, in which Lehman, 47, will challenge higher education to provide fresh leadership in areas, like health care, that are critical to the well-being of all humanity.

Inaugural Events at Weill Cornell Medical College

At Weill Cornell in New York City, the day's events include a special breakfast with New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Citicorp Chairman and Medical College Board Chairman Sanford Weill, and other dignitaries; the presentation by Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, on "Emerging and Re-emerging Diseases of the 21st Century"; and President Lehman's inaugural address. Following his address, President Lehman will formally meet the press at a special luncheon briefing and attend a private luncheon with other leading university presidents. He will then highlight Cornell University's ongoing community involvement with New York City at a special neighborhood tree planting ceremony on Amsterdam Avenue on the Upper West Side, and with a visit to the University's Cooperative Extension Office on 34th Street.

President Lehman's Global Vision

President Lehman's inaugural address will articulate his vision for Cornell and higher education generally and for global health care particularly. Among his salient themes are his insistence that the continued development of science and technology, in this post-genomic era, is critical to achieving a more humane and sustainable world. At the same time that science strives to improve the human condition, extraordinary efforts must also continue to transcend the boundaries of race and religion, issues that have universally and historically been the stimuli for conflict and mistrust. The ability to coexist with and actively engage complexity and diversity must transcend nationalism.

Weill Cornell Medical College's Global Legacy

In many respects, Weill Cornell Medical College has been working towards Lehman's vision throughout its 105-year history. Like Cornell University, the Medical College has sought to bring opportunity to where it did not exist before -- narrowing gaps that separate genders, races, and the quality of medical care, and fostering communities where the opportunity to learn medicine and attain health care is available to all.

Weill Cornell Medical College maintains one of the largest percentages of underrepresented minority students of any private medical school in the country and the largest percentage of any public or private medical school in New York State.

From the Medical College's first graduating class in 1899, which included 12 women -- a rarity for the time -- to the current Class of 2007, where women outnumber men, 54 to 47, Weill Cornell has always fostered a coeducational and transnational approach to medical education. For example, Ida Scutter, one of the 12 women to graduate in 1899, took her education to India where she founded a hospital, nursing home, and medical college. And Cornell's global perspective has continued since then.

In the Class of 2003, 38 of the 101 physicians that graduated from Weill Cornell took part in at least one rotation overseas. At the American Hospital of Paris and the Klinikum Rechts der Isar in Munich, as well as in 19 other countries -- as diverse as Argentina, Austria, Bolivia, Cuba, Denmark, Guatemala, India, Senegal, the Solomon Islands, and Sweden -- Weill Cornell students were learning from and teaching others.

The faculty at Weill Cornell is also actively involved in a reciprocal sharing of knowledge with faculty across the globe -- from Europe to Africa. Each fall, at the American Hospital of Istanbul, for instance, Weill Cornell physicians lead seminars that provide Turkish doctors with an opportunity to learn about the latest in American medical advances. And, at the same time, Cornellians learn as much as they teach -- from those who approach medicine and life with perspectives markedly different from their own.

In Africa, this spirit of sharing continues as well. Last month, the Bugando University College of Health Sciences, a newly established medical school in Tanzania, opened its doors and began training physicians for a nation in desperate need of them. This was the result of an international collaboration among sources and resources as diverse as the Catholic Church, the Tanzanian government, and Weill Cornell Medical College, which provided invaluable direction, training, technology, and supplies.

Finally, the Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar -- the site of President Lehman's first inauguration -- represents the first case of an American medical degree being offered in a foreign country. Moreover, it is the first institution of higher education in Qatar to be coeducational; women make up 70 percent of its inaugural class.

President Jeffrey S. Lehman

President Lehman, the first Cornell graduate ever to preside over the University, is a highly regarded legal scholar who, as dean of the University of Michigan Law School, rose to national prominence for his important role in the recent historic Supreme Court decision in favor of affirmative action. Lehman graduated from Cornell in 1977 where he earned a bachelor's in mathematics. In 1981, he earned a law degree and a master's in public policy from the University of Michigan, graduating magna cum laude and also serving as Editor-in-Chief of the Michigan Law Review. He has also served as law clerk to Associate Justice John Paul Stevens of the U.S. Supreme Court, and he has practiced tax law in Washington, DC. A native New Yorker, President Lehman was born in Bronxville and grew up in White Plains, NY, and Bethesda, MD.

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