COPR Alumni
Class of 2009
Christina Clark
Term: 2005–2009
Ms. Christina Clark, whose son was diagnosed with ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease) in 1997, left her career in local politics and community service to establish the Foundation for Interdisciplinary Motor Neuron Medicine (The ALS BioTeam). The foundation has been the catalyst for using interdisciplinary strategies in several ALS research studies relating to drug screening and stem cell research. The ALS BioTeam focuses on accelerating therapeutic opportunities by acting as a voluntary facilitator for inter-academic and industry collaborations.
Ms. Clark is a trustee of the ALS Association (ALSA) and serves on ALSA’s Research and Advocacy Committees, and she often serves as ALSA’s board liaison at scientific meetings. She is a member of the National Institutes of Health/National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke oversight committee for a clinical trial. In 1996, she was appointed a commissioner for the State of Michigan Commission on Services to the Aging by Governor John Engler. From 1992 to 2002, Ms. Clark was a member of the Board of Directors of the Greater Michigan Chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association, and she was the chapter’s Public Policy Chair from 1996 to 2002.
Ms. Clark has held positions as Vice President of Geonomics, Inc., and as a consultant and Director of Legislative Affairs for the Mutual Insurance Corporation of America and for American Physicians Assurance. She was elected a County Commissioner from Lapeer County, Michigan, and was named Citizen of the Year in 1997. She is the founder and President of Metamora Concerned Citizens Association, which provides a grass-roots base for community advocacy on Superfund, 911 emergency, and other local issues.
Ms. Clark received a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University, a master’s degree from Harvard University, and an M.B.A. from Michigan State University. She resides with her husband on their farm in Metamora, Michigan.
Valda Boyd Ford
Term: 2005–2009
Ms. Valda Boyd Ford is a well-known presenter on leadership, public health, and cultural competency. She is President and Chief Executive Officer of the Center for Human Diversity, Inc., one of the nation’s leading training institutes on cultural competency since 1998. Her particular interest is in creating environments that allow for all people to be respected regardless of race, religion, national origin, or other perceived differences. She served as Director of Community and Multicultural Affairs at the University of Nebraska Medical Center for almost six years and, since 2005, has served as the Director of Refugee Initiatives for Unite for Sight, an international agency dedicated to eradicating preventable blindness. She is the host and executive producer of Valda’s Place, a weekly cable television talk show, and a member of the National Speakers Association.
Ms. Ford has developed support groups, provided small and large group training, and presented or consulted in Saudi Arabia, United States Virgin Islands, China, the Netherlands, Poland, Ghana, Saudi Arabia, Denmark, Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka, Wales, Afghanistan, Australia, and 25 U.S. states. In conjunction with the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute’s The Heart Truth™ campaign, she founded the annual Heart and Soul Red Dress Event to raise awareness of heart disease among underserved women.
Ms. Ford has worked with Unite for Sight in refugee clinics in Africa and Asia. She developed partnerships with eye doctors and surgeons to provide free sight-restoring cataract surgery as well as thousands of pairs of eyeglasses to refugees living in camps. Ms. Ford was recognized as Unite for Sight’s Humanitarian of the Year in 2005 and its Volunteer of the Year in 2006.
Ms. Ford created a series of DVDs on cultural competency, intercultural communication, and her work with refugees from Liberia. She has an M.P.H. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a master’s degree in nursing administration from Creighton University, and a B.S. from Winston-Salem State University.
Nicole Johnson
Term: 2005–2009
Ms. Nicole Johnson is an international diabetes advocate. She travels extensively, promoting awareness, prevention, and early detection of this condition, which she shares. She is also a corporate and government affairs advisor for patient groups and biotechnology companies. In the last nine years, Ms. Johnson has helped raise nearly $20 million for diabetes research and programs. She is the president of the Nicole Johnson Foundation, which supports diabetes education programs across the country.
Ms. Johnson hosts the weekly CNBC diabetes talk show dLife and writes monthly columns and articles for various publications and Web sites. She has published four books, including three diabetes cookbooks coauthored with renowned chef Mr. Food. Her autobiography, Living with Diabetes, in part chronicles her experiences as Miss America 1999.
Ms. Johnson serves on numerous advisory boards, including the Tampa Bay chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and the Education for Children with Diabetes Foundation. She is a past national board member of the American Diabetes Association. Ms. Johnson has received numerous awards for her advocacy work.
She holds an M.A. in journalism from Regent University and an M.P.H. from the University of Pittsburgh. Ms. Johnson lives in Tampa, Florida, with her daughter, Ava Grace, who was born in early 2006.
Cynthia A. Lindquist
Term: 2005–2009
Dr. Cynthia Lindquist, also known as Ta’sunka Wicahpi Win (Star Horse Woman), is a member of the Spirit Lake Dakota Nation and President of Cankdeska Cikana (Little Hoop) Community College, one of 37 tribal colleges and universities in the United States.
Prior to serving as President of Cankdeska Cikana Community College, Dr. Lindquist worked in health care administration, starting as the Spirit Lake tribe’s health director/planner in the early 1980s. She wrote and developed the Northern Plains Healthy Start initiative and is an adjunct faculty member at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Dr. Lindquist served as Executive Director, North Dakota Indian Affairs Commission, and as Senior Advisor to the Director, Indian Health Service, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
In 2004, Dr. Lindquist was appointed by President Bush to serve as a member of the National Advisory Council on Indian Education. She is also a member of the Barbara Jordan Health Policy Scholars advisory committee for the Kaiser Family Foundation and a founding member of the National Indian Women’s Health Resource Center. Dr. Lindquist serves as secretary for the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, an advocacy organization for tribal colleges and universities. She also serves on the American Indian College Fund Board of Trustees.
Dr. Lindquist earned a master’s degree in public administration from the University of South Dakota and a doctorate in educational leadership from the University of North Dakota.
Marjorie K. Mau
Term: 2005–2009
Dr. Marjorie Mau is Professor and Chair of the Department of Native Hawaiian Health at the John A. Burns School of Medicine of the University of Hawai’i. Dr. Mau, a Native Hawaiian, was born and raised in Honolulu and has spent more than 12 years working with Native Hawaiian communities to improve their health status and eliminate health disparities. The Department of Native Hawaiian Health is the first of its kind in an accredited U.S. medical school. The department’s role is to highlight the unique contributions the indigenous people of Hawai’i bring to the state, the United States, and the international community and to improve access to health care in underserved communities of Native Hawaiians and Pacific Peoples throughout Hawai’i. As a physician, Dr. Mau provides diabetes and endocrinology subspecialty services to patients on the island of Molokai, where approximately 60% of the residents are of Native Hawaiian ancestry.
Dr. Mau has gained a reputation for building and fostering relationships for the betterment of health and for the elimination of health care disparities, especially among Native Hawaiians. A major focus of Dr. Mau’s career continues to be the prevention and control of diabetes mellitus in Native Hawaiians and other ethnic populations. Her work has led to the development and implementation of the Kulia Ola Kino Maika’i Program (Strive for Good Health), a peer educator–led program that has been shown to improve diet and exercise behaviors in Native Hawaiians with or at risk for diabetes.
Dr. Mau is also a strong advocate for increasing the number of Native Hawaiians and other underrepresented ethnic minority students in higher education. In the Department of Native Hawaiian Health, two programs—the Imi Ho’ola (Those Who Seek to Heal) Program and the Native Hawaiian Center of Excellence—are aimed at recruiting and supporting medical students and faculty of Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Island ancestry to pursue careers in health and medicine.
Dr. Mau is an active member of the Ahahui O Na Kauka (the Association of Native Hawaiian Physicians), the American Diabetes Association, and the Endocrine Society, and she is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians and the American Society of Internal Medicine.
She received her undergraduate and medical degrees from Creighton University and her M.S. from Harvard School of Public Health. Dr. Mau enjoys body surfing, hiking, and bicycling and is a member of Pa Ku’i A Lua, a Native Hawaiian martial arts group.
James H. Wendorf
Term: 2006–2009
Mr. James Wendorf is Executive Director of the National Center for Learning Disabilities (NCLD), which seeks to ensure that the nation’s 15 million children, adolescents, and adults with learning disabilities have every opportunity to succeed in school, work, and life. He directs NCLD’s efforts to provide essential information to parents, professionals, and individuals with learning disabilities; to promote research and programs that foster effective learning; and to advocate for policies that protect and strengthen educational rights and opportunities. Get Ready to Read!, a national initiative to screen four-year-olds for skills critical to success in reading, is the largest program in this effort.
For the past 20 years, Mr. Wendorf has worked in the not-for-profit sector to build national and international partnerships supporting learning and literacy programs. These programs have won support from a wide range of foundation and corporate partners, including the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Cisco Systems Foundation, Ford Motor Company Fund, Visa USA, the Goizueta Foundation, the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Prior to joining NCLD in 1999, Mr. Wendorf served as Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Reading Is Fundamental, Inc., the nation’s largest nonprofit children’s literacy organization, based in Washington, DC.
Mr. Wendorf serves on the advisory boards of the National Association for the Education of African American Children with Learning Disabilities and the Home School Institute. He is frequently called upon by the news media to comment on policies and programs affecting individuals with learning disabilities; recent appearances include C-SPAN, The New York Times, the Associated Press, and Christian Science Monitor.
Mr. Wendorf earned a B.A. cum laude from Yale College and master’s degrees in English language and literature from the University of Cambridge and Cornell University. He and his wife, Jessie Lacy Wendorf, have two daughters and live in West Windsor, New Jersey.
