Brush Creek Community Partners-Monthly Newsletter

Missouri Governor Matt Blunt has appointed Stan Archie to the state’s Board of Education.

Archie is president of Christian Fellowship Ministries and the Kansas City Leadership Foundation. He is a founding member of the former Brush Creek Partners Steering Committee and has served as president of Brush Creek Community Partners since November 2004.

“Rev. Archie will be a strong advocate for ensuring that our children receive the best education Missouri has to offer,” Blunt said. “I am pleased that he has agreed to serve Missouri’s students in this capacity.”
The eight-member Board of Education is responsible for the supervision of instruction in the state’s public schools. Its duties and responsibilities range from preschool to the postsecondary and adult levels. While the board does not have direct authority over higher education institutions, it does set standards for and approves professional programs for teachers and school administrators in Missouri's public and private higher education institutions.
Subject to Senate confirmation, Archie’s service on the board will end July 1, 2014.

On November 7, Missouri voters approved a constitutional amendment ensuring that any stem cell research and treatments allowed under federal law will continue to be allowed this state. With the measure’s passage, the Stowers Institute for Medical Research announced its attention “will now be directed toward further recruitment of the world’s leading scientists to the Stowers Institute, including stem cell researchers.”

Further, the Stowers Institute will begin planning for future growth beyond the anticipated full occupancy of the current facility at 1000 E. 50th Street, estimated to occur in 2008 or 2009.

In a statement released shortly after the election, the Stowers Institute said, “Over the past year, the institute has expended significant energy and resources to evaluate the possibility of adding 600,000 square feet of research space to the existing campus. That effort has matured to a point that it can be shared with the Institute’s Scientific Advisory Board for a careful evaluation of whether the facilities envisioned will constitute an optimum environment for discovery research.”

The institute’s Scientific Advisory Board will meet next April. Upon completion of its review, the advisory board will convey results of its examination review to the Stowers Institute Board of Directors, which will then consider the campus expansion possibility.

According to the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation’s 2005 report, Time to Get It Right: A Strategy for Higher Education in Kansas City, the Stowers Institute is currently at about $60 million in annual research spending. It is funded and organized to see research expenditures increase by 20 to 25 percent a year. Stowers is on track to support research levels of roughly $150 million by 2010 and $300 million by 2015.

At its November meeting, the Brush Creek Community Partners Board of Directors elected 2007 officers and some new board members who will lead the organization in the New Year.

PARTNER UPDATES

C. Lee Jones is stepping down as president of Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering & Technology after 13 years. Effective January 1, Mary Moeller, Linda Hall’s library operations officer, will become the institution’s chief operating officer. Jones, a founding member of Brush Partner’s Steering Committee and a member of BCCP’s board since its formalization in 1998, will continue to stay at the library to serve as an advisor to its Board of Directors. Jones led a recently completed $18.5 million, 30,000 square foot expansion designed to accommodate the library’s growth for the next 50 years.

Karen Dace has been named the University of Missouri-Kansas City’s deputy chancellor for Diversity, Access and Equity. Dace leaves her position as associate vice president for Diversity at the University of Utah to begin work at UMKC February 1, 2007. At the University of Utah, she led diversity efforts in areas of academic programs, student support and research. Dace collaborated with deans and faculty in the development of a successful, ongoing faculty recruitment and retention plan that has resulted in a significant increase in African-American and Latino faculty. At UMKC, she will have a joint appointment as associate professor in the College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Communication Studies.

The Pembroke Hill School has appointed Steve Bellis head of school, effective July 1, 2007 upon the retirement of current head of school Dick Hibschman. Bellis has been with Pembroke Hill since 2001, presently serving its assistant head of school – advancement and finance. Prior to joining Pembroke Hill, he was with Hallmark Cards for 15 years where he held several key senior management positions. Hibschman announced his retirement last spring after 11 years at the school. He is credited with enhancing the educational program with special attention to expanding the arts and the student support services, increasing total by over 17 percent to nearly 1,200 students and growing the proportion of students of color enrolled in Pembroke Hill to 18 percent.Hibschman also helped Pembroke Hill develop an extensive Facilities Master Plan and embark on a capital campaign that raised $32 million.

The Greater Kansas City Community Foundation has awarded the University of Missouri-Kansas City 2007 Leadership Grants totaling $1.45 million, representing the largest Community Foundation Leadership Grant total pledged to a single institution. UMKC’s School of Education was awarded nearly $1 million for two of its initiatives, including $850,000 for the Institute for Urban Education, a program that prepares teachers for success in urban schools and $100,000 to support the Education Policy Fellowship Program, an effort to further the leadership of higher education administrators. The $500,000 balance is going to UMKC’’s Henry W. Bloch School of Business and Public Administration to enhance the school’s Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, which supports translational research in the life sciences and creates new knowledge and models for emerging businesses.

Hogan Preparatory Academy’s football team advanced to the state championship game this year for the first time in the school’s history. With a record of 12 –1 in the season, the Hogan Prep Rams, considered under-dogs in the state playoffs, took on Blair Oaks of Jefferson City. In losing 24 to 32 in the final game, the Rams ended the season ranked second in Missouri’s Class 2.

Kansas City consumers have once again ranked Saint Luke’s Hospital first for high quality health care services in the metropolitan area, according to National Research Corporation (NRC) 2006/07 Consumer Choice Awards. Saint Luke’s Hospital was the only Kansas City area hospital to receive the award. It has ranked first in the Consumer Choice Award every year the NRC has presented the honor since its inception in 1996.

Carl Schramm, president and chief executive officer of the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, has been appointed by Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez to serve on a new panel to understand better how U.S. innovation contributes to American economic prosperity and high living standards. Schramm is part of an advisory committee that includes 15 business and academic leaders - including six Fortune 500 executives. The Measuring Innovation in the 21st Century Economy Advisory Committee will help develop better ways to measure innovation so that the public and policy makers can understand better its impact on economic growth and productivity. The Advisory Committee will hold its first meeting in February. Schramm is the author the new book, The Entrepreneurial Imperative: How America's Economic Miracle Will Reshape The World-And Change Your Life (HarperCollins).

Research Breakthroughs

University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine researchers have been instrumental in an international study that has found misoprostol, a drug used to treat ulcers, is effective in preventing excessive postpartum bleeding. The study, conducted with researchers in India, was published October 7 in The Lancet, a British medical journal. The findings are significant as about half a million women around the world die each year from complications during pregnancy or childbirth. A third of those deaths are attributable to postpartum hemorrhage, with 99 percent of those deaths occurring in developing countries. Misoprostol is less expensive and more convenient compared to injectable oxytocin, which remains the drug of choice for prevention of postpartum hemorrhage in a hospital-based setting. The study’s findings have hit news outlets around the globe.

The lab team of Paul Trainor, assistant investigator at Stowers Institute for Medical Research, collaborated with United Kingdom colleagues at the University of Manchester Dental School to identify the cellular origins for craniofacial abnormalities that occur in Treacher Collins syndrome. Treacher Collins syndrome is a rare disorder of craniofacial development affecting about 1 in 50,000 individuals. It is characterized by ear, nose, upper, and lower jaw anomalies that include cleft palate. The findings, published in the September 5 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), establish that the craniofacial anomalies associated with a mouse model of Treacher Collins syndrome arise due to a high degree of cell death, which leads to a failure to produce sufficient neural crest cells. The team also found that the few neural crest cells that are produced have compromised proliferation capacities.

SWOPE’S MOBILE CLINC TO REACH UNDERSERVED

Swope Health Services’ Mobile Medical Clinic (MMC) hits the streets early next year. The MMC will become a source of community-based comprehensive health care for the medically underserved and vulnerable children and adults who are faced with inadequate transportation and a shortage of health care providers. Two exam/treatment rooms will be staffed with a full-time nurse practitioners, a registered nursed and a certified medical assistant. Services on board include blood tests, cancer screenings, STD/HIV testing, pregnancy testing, immunizations, well-baby checks, hearing and vision examinations and treatment for non-emergent illnesses. Swope Health Services will be the only federally qualified health center with a MMC in Greater Kansas City.

UMKC OAK STREET WEST DEVELOPMENT ANTICIPATED

The University of Missouri-Kansas City is looking forward to the construction of Oak Street West Development at 5000 Oak Street in the near future. A groundbreaking ceremony was held in November for the development, which will include 513-beds of student housing. The Oak Street West Development will replace the Twin Oaks buildings, which UMKC acquired in 1998. The property has approximately 6.7 acres and two 11-story apartment buildings with 300 apartments in each. The existing facilities have significant deferred maintenance, code deficiencies and lack basic amenities including air conditioning, requiring its demolishing.

First announced in early 2003, much of the “Campaign for the New Saint Luke’s” has taken place behind the scenes. Over the last few months, several visible steps have been taken to implement the 25-year, $300 million expansion and renovation of the 17.2 acre campus in the heart of the city.

Ground was broken in October for a new $145 million facility for the Saint Luke’s Mid America Heart Institute. The new Heart Institute building, which includes expanded research space, will open by 2010.
In November, ground was broken on two new health care facilities for women at Saint Luke’s Hospital, the Ellen J. Hockaday Center for Women’s Care and the Muriel I. Kauffman Women’s Heart Center.

The 23,000-square-foot Ellen J. Hockaday Center for Women’s Health is expected to cost $11 million and be completed by late 2008. The Muriel I. Kauffman Women’s Heart Center focuses on the specialized needs of women, from prevention to cardiovascular disease treatment. The 16,000-square-foot Heart Center is expected to cost $8 million and be completed in late 2010. The adjoining facilities, which will be located on the north end of the hospital’s midtown campus, will offer comprehensive, coordinated care. They will also provide a bridge to other Saint Luke’s programs that offer women’s and sub-specialized cardiac services.

Saint Luke’s heart program began in 1960 with the opening of a cardiac catheterization laboratory. During the next two decades, the program grew rapidly with advancements in heart catheterization, pacemakers, portable defibrillators, and open heart surgery. This growth led to the development of the world’s first dedicated heart hospital at Saint Luke’s in 1980. During the 1980s and 1990s the Heart Institute became established as a regional, national, and international center.

Today, Heart Institute doctors publish their research in more than 40 national publications each year and participate in more than 100 clinical trials. In addition, the Heart Institute has one of the largest patient care research databases in the country. In addition to pioneering new treatments, Heart Institute doctors have helped establish national and community standards of care and played an important role in educating students, residents, and other physicians. Many of its doctors are international specialists in their field and teach other physicians around the globe. To date the Heart Institute has trained more than 20,000 physicians in cardiovascular medicine and surgery.

Nearly a century ago, Saint Luke’s became the first hospital in the Greater Kansas City area to provide prenatal support to expecting mothers. Since then, Saint Luke’s has become one of the largest and most comprehensive providers of high-risk obstetric and neonatal intensive care in the community. Today, Saint Luke’s seeks to expand its continuum of care by offering specialized health services for women through menopause and later life. A major component of this effort is the new Center for Women’s Care.

Founded in 1994, the Women’s Heart Center was the first cardiac center of its kind in the United States to actively address this serious women’s health issue—the leading cause of death in women. Now, hospitals throughout the nation frequently consult with the Women’s Heart Center and use its program as a model. The center has received national recognition on several occasions including being chosen by Women’s Day magazine as one of the top ten heart centers for women in the country.

Saint Luke’s also celebrated the opening of the new Childrens’s SPOT (which stands for Speech, Physical, and Occupational Therapy) at 4333 Pennsylvania Ave. in December The $3 million facility opens for treatment services and developmental preschool classes Jan. 2. The SPOT seeks to provide early, intensive intervention and support for any child experiencing physical or developmental challenges. Comprehensive therapy is offered for infants and preschool-aged children with speech, language, hearing, learning, or physical disabilities regardless of the family’s ability to pay.

The two-story, 10,500-square-foot building includes a vaulted atrium that provides natural light and room for an indoor playground that fosters gross motor development; increased parking; a library/board room with resources accessible to parents and visitors; a designated space for employee offices with observation windows to the lower level; and four exam rooms for The SPOT’s Intensive Care Nursery Follow-up Clinic, originally housed at Saint Luke’s Hospital.

Abby Freeman has a modest challenge ahead of her — only to recruit and retain the best and brightest scientists in the world to this midsize, Midwest American city.

So how does Freeman, vice president for administration at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research, compete with Boston, New York or San Francisco? Well, she doesn’t do it alone. Freeman credits the city itself with helping scientists and their families see the livability and affordability Kansas City has to offer, along with other draws.

“This city has a wonderful combination of attractions from sports to the arts. It’s so much fun to talk to newcomers, to help them make choices about where they’re going to live and what’s important to them,” Freeman, a member of the Brush Creek Community Partners Board of Directors says.

But for her highly educated potential colleagues, arts and parks aren’t enough.

Scientists they hope to bring to Stowers are looking for quality education in this community for their children. And so is Freeman.

“My passion is education, because in trying to recruit scientists at UT Southwestern (her previous employer, the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas) and at Stowers, I learned our educational system provides a real challenge for the science community,” Freeman adds.

For her role, “I’d like to help ensure that all schools in this area are as strong as possible, offer the widest possible curriculum as possible.”

Through a program called STARS, Stowers helps secondary teachers get excited about science then helps them take that excitement and knowledge back to their students in the classroom.

At the next level, “It’s a real challenge to help college students understand what it takes to get a job in an intensive research environment such as Stowers, especially when they have haven’t had that experience.”

Enter the Stowers Scholars program where college students spend eight to ten weeks in a laboratory of a science institution. “For some, it’s the first opportunity they’ve had in a research intensive environment.”

It’s worth the investment because Freeman knows that the best top graduates will be recruited from all over the U.S. and it will be a real challenge to keep them in Kansas City. She is also excited about the potential between the University of Missouri-Kansas City, the Stowers Institute and Midwest Research Institute to strengthen the area as a learning corridor.

In supporting the whole educational system, Freeman says, “We can create a path to grow our scientists, see them as grad students and see them again as Ph.D.s — to put them in the pipeline,” In other words, she says, “Help them bloom where we’re planted.” And in doing that along the Brush Creek Corridor, she’ll help some of the best scientists in the world put down roots in Kansas City.