Basketball, health behaviors and remembering Eve

Welcome back!

Hope those of you who went away for spring break had a great time.

Your feedback

Thanks to those of you who have sent comments on prior blogs. I appreciate all comments, positive and negative. In most cases, I’ll respond to your comments directly in the blog without mentioning names. I will respond privately when that seems indicated.

Exciting weekend games

Wow! That was quite a men’s basketball game Saturday. I suspect a lot of us were on the edge of our seats, but the men’s Tar Heels pulled it off Saturday and then again Sunday. Congratulations to Roy Williams, the other coaches and the Tar Heels for the ACC championship. What a fantastic team! And ditto for the women’s team, Sylvia Hatchell and the women’s coaches. I am always impressed by how good our folks sound when they are interviewed. And of course, there’s much more “March Madness” to come. Their efforts remind us of how much we can accomplish when we work together as a team, whether competing in sports or searching for solutions to public health problems.

School as a role model

Those of you at the school hopefully have seen the excellent diet and eating tips in the atrium provided by the Nutrition department. Nutrition faculty members are doing some very cool things around campus. Just last week, Amanda Holliday and her “Healthy Heels” club put on a cooking demonstration during lunch in Lenoir Hall to show students how to cook healthy meals and snacks in their dorm rooms with ingredients available on campus. I’d like to see the school be a role model for healthy behaviors. We are going to sponsor some road races and help with the annual Heart Walk to show our support for local activities and as a way to align what we preach and practice. The first event is the Franklin 5000 April 26, 2008. Stay tuned for announcements: we will give away some race entries.

Op Ed

Julie Macmillan and I have received a lot of comments on the Op Ed piece from Friday’s News and Observer. The previous week Steve Wing and Cat Warren had a column in the same newspaper. Debates about academic issues and extending those to our school are healthy. Good people may differ on how they feel about issues like corporate partnerships, naming the school and the like. As I mentioned last Monday, we are scheduling some forums so faculty and staff can raise issues or make comments about anything related to the SPH.

Eve Carson memorial

Tuesday at 4pm, there will be a memorial for Eve Carson in the Dean Smith Center. Classes in our school will be cancelled from 4pm-6pm so people can attend. Many in our School, especially our undergrads, knew Eve and have taken this tragedy really hard. I was so moved by the words of her father, Bob Carson, on the UNC website. It is nearly unfathomable how this man who was in the throes of the greatest tragedy that can befall a parent was able to transcend his own family’s terrible loss and speak with optimism to her generation (http://universityrelations.unc.edu/alert/carson/bobcarsonremarks.html). This must be what Albert Camus was thinking when he wrote, “In the depth of winter I learned that there was in me an invincible summer.”

Have a good week. Barbara