Speaker 1: Our young women are able to see themselves and they're
Speaker 1: able to imagine and to dream from a very early
Speaker 1: phase of life. And I think in this they have
Speaker 1: learned how to take on leadership and they've done it
Speaker 1: very powerfully. What it does is create a very strong
Speaker 1: foundation that I think then allows you to launch really
Speaker 1: into the future. That is Dr Paula Johnson talking about
Speaker 1: the young women she leads as president of Wellesley College.
Speaker 1: Dr Johnson has held that position since two thousand and sixteen,
Speaker 1: the first African American woman to do so. But that's
Speaker 1: just one of her many first I'm a land Verviere
Speaker 1: and this is Seneca's on Women to Hear. Were bringing
Speaker 1: you one hundred of the world's most inspiring and history
Speaker 1: making women you need to hear. Before joining Wellesley, Dr
Speaker 1: Johnson was already a groundbreaker in women's health. She holds
Speaker 1: two degrees from Harvard, both an m d. And a
Speaker 1: master's in public health. As a cardiologist at Brigham and
Speaker 1: Women's Hospital, she founded the Conner Center for Women's Health
Speaker 1: and Gender Biology. Her research into gender differences in medicine
Speaker 1: has been eye opening. She was one of the first
Speaker 1: to question whether women were being overlooked when it came
Speaker 1: to cardiac care, and her work was the basis for
Speaker 1: her popular Ted talk his and her healthcare. Listen and
Speaker 1: learn why Dr Paula Johnson is one of Seneca's One
Speaker 1: Women to Hear. I'm here today with Dr Paula Johnson,
Speaker 1: the President of Wellesley, and I am thrilled to be
Speaker 1: with her. She is so remarkable in every way that
Speaker 1: I'm eager to have you and our audience land come
Speaker 1: to know her better as well. So, Dr Johnson, maybe
Speaker 1: we can start by my mentioning the fact that you're
Speaker 1: an internationally recognized researcher, educator, cardiologist, health policy expert, and
Speaker 1: you've dedicated your career to transforming the health of women.
Speaker 1: But since two thousand and sixteen, you've been the president
Speaker 1: of Wellesley College. So I'm wondering, is there a common
Speaker 1: thread that runs through this remarkable career. Milan. Let me
Speaker 1: just begin by telling by just saying that it is
Speaker 1: so wonderful to be here with you. Let me just
Speaker 1: say that, you know, I would say the through line
Speaker 1: really in my life is a deep commitment to improving
Speaker 1: women's lives, and a good portune of my career was
Speaker 1: spent in really focusing on women's health and well being.
Speaker 1: And you know, with that in academic medicine, there's there's
Speaker 1: really a commitment to education, both educating young professionals but
Speaker 1: also educating women with regard to their health. And I
Speaker 1: think you know, after uh an over thirty year career
Speaker 1: in academic medicine, you know, coming to Wellesley, you know
Speaker 1: the focus here on education and the development of young women. Um,
Speaker 1: where we're focused on their development, how we can embrace
Speaker 1: the diversity of the young women here, and also how
Speaker 1: we think about the role of the college as really
Speaker 1: the premier women's college, How we think about the role
Speaker 1: of the college looking outward as we think about the
Speaker 1: roles of women in the world. Well, that's a very
Speaker 1: clear common thread and I can see how your career
Speaker 1: has evolved to this point today. Was there something in
Speaker 1: your background? Was there some something catalytic when you grew
Speaker 1: up that brought you to this place in life When
Speaker 1: I look back, I'm from Brooklyn, New York, and UM,
Speaker 1: I would say that my mother, Grace Johnson, had a
Speaker 1: a tremendous influence on me. She was truly a fierce
Speaker 1: believer in the power of education, and she was also
Speaker 1: deeply committed to civic engagement UM, an engagement in terms
Speaker 1: of engagement in the neighborhood, in our Brooklyn neighborhood or
Speaker 1: the neighborhoods that we we lived in, UM as well
Speaker 1: as in our public schools, in terms of really being
Speaker 1: on the front lines to ensure that her daughters, I
Speaker 1: have one sister, one younger sister, got the kind of
Speaker 1: education and that all kids got the kind of education
Speaker 1: that she felt a public system should provide. UM. And
Speaker 1: I should add that, you know, one of her dreams
Speaker 1: was to go to college, and she finished college the
Speaker 1: year after I finished medical school, So there's clearly perseverance
Speaker 1: there as well. And you know, the other woman in
Speaker 1: my life was my maternal grandmother, Louise Young, who really UM,
Speaker 1: you know, she struggled with depression for a good part
Speaker 1: of her life. UM. She helped to inform my decision
Speaker 1: to enter medicine and really pushing forward on this issue
Speaker 1: of discovering how women and men experienced disease differently. But
Speaker 1: what I can say about both of them is that
Speaker 1: I learned a lot about resilience. But I also learned
Speaker 1: that the particularly positive impact of a strong belief in
Speaker 1: your abilities when someone else has that strong belief and
Speaker 1: then you absorb that. I think that, UM, you know,
Speaker 1: my mother had a tremendous early belief in me the
Speaker 1: potential to basically do whatever I wanted to do, and
Speaker 1: UM that I think has really impacted me, both in
Speaker 1: medicine and for sure in higher education. How we approach
Speaker 1: each student, how we approach the potential in uh in
Speaker 1: for in my case, uh in women, UM that is
Speaker 1: limitless with the ability that that our students should flourish.
Speaker 1: So I think I really trace it, um back to
Speaker 1: back to my childhood and then having those experiences of
Speaker 1: um of mentors throughout my life. Ruth Hubbard, who was
Speaker 1: the first tenured biology professor at Harvard, was an early
Speaker 1: mentor and somebody who saw in me what I don't
Speaker 1: think I could have seen at at that early stage.
Speaker 1: So you never know where those touch points are and
Speaker 1: what sparks uh kind of an idea or a belief
Speaker 1: UM in in the young people that you interact with.
Speaker 1: So beautifully said, and you know, the touch points of
Speaker 1: a parent or or a mentor UM just really important
Speaker 1: and reinforcing that from your own experience, I think is
Speaker 1: an important lesson in and of itself. So you've devoted
Speaker 1: much of your scientific and medical career to athering knowledge
Speaker 1: of the biological differences between women and men, which is
Speaker 1: so fascinating. What do your finding show and how is
Speaker 1: this knowledge important? Well, you know, it's it's a very
Speaker 1: interesting Milan that when I started my career over thirty
Speaker 1: years ago, UM, we really had hardly any data on
Speaker 1: women's health beyond their reproductive function. And you know, I
Speaker 1: trace my curiosity as an investigator back again to that
Speaker 1: early mentor Ruth Hubbard, who turned her her more basic
Speaker 1: science career into one of really looking at issues of
Speaker 1: women in science and UM it really sparked an interest
Speaker 1: in me to better understand not only the role of
Speaker 1: women in medicine, but also let's understand how science does
Speaker 1: or does not represent women and UM Through that, you know,
Speaker 1: basically over twenty five years ago, it was really the
Speaker 1: first legislation past under President Clinton to include women UH
Speaker 1: and minorities in phase three, meaning later phase clinical trials.
Speaker 1: And with that, what we began to learn is that
Speaker 1: women and men can express and experience health and disease differently,
Speaker 1: and UM, women and men metabolized drugs differently, They have
Speaker 1: different experiences, and the health care system which impacts their
Speaker 1: health and their lived experience also impacts their health differently.
Speaker 1: So and then you overlay issues like race, ethnicity, and
Speaker 1: you know, the story evolves and um, you know the
Speaker 1: implications of this knowledge are really enormous because what we've
Speaker 1: learned is that UM various diseases can be expressed differently.
Speaker 1: And when you don't include women in the science all
Speaker 1: the way from the basic science to the clinical trials,
Speaker 1: that we mishalf the population and we don't necessarily get
Speaker 1: the answer that is the right answer for women. UM.
Speaker 1: Let me just give you an example, UM, in heart disease.
Speaker 1: So that's my my specialty. We know that women and
Speaker 1: men can experience different symptoms. We know that certain risk
Speaker 1: factors are different for women, for for coronary artery disease
Speaker 1: or narrowing of the arteries in the heart. We know
Speaker 1: that there are certain um aspects of heart disease that
Speaker 1: look different. For example, when a woman has a heart attack,
Speaker 1: the vessels and the heart can look different than the
Speaker 1: vessels in a male who has a heart attack. And
Speaker 1: some of the medications that we use, for example, to
Speaker 1: prevent heart attacks are experienced differently with regard to side effects,
Speaker 1: and and that isn't even adding issues of uh, the
Speaker 1: impact of pregnancy on risk for heart disease. So, in
Speaker 1: all of that that I've just said in the past
Speaker 1: minute or so, imagine if we didn't study women, or
Speaker 1: if women weren't included in the studies, And that in
Speaker 1: fact was the case over thirty years ago. So we've
Speaker 1: we've been able to learn a lot, but there's so
Speaker 1: much more because women are still underrepresented. Frequently the data
Speaker 1: are not presented in a way that we understand the
Speaker 1: impact in women, UM and UH. And so there's a
Speaker 1: lot more to learn and a lot more to understand
Speaker 1: about various diseases and in fact how to best prevent
Speaker 1: and treat them UM in women and men. It's really
Speaker 1: interesting and and it's so impactful because if you don't
Speaker 1: look at it in a sex disaggregated way, you're really
Speaker 1: not addressing the differences in half the population. I remember
Speaker 1: hearing once that the experiments on low dose aspirin visa
Speaker 1: vi um retarding heart disease we're done on men and
Speaker 1: yet being prescribed to women without knowing if it would
Speaker 1: have the same impact. Is that correct? Oh well, Milan,
Speaker 1: you're you're bringing up the uh, the Physician's Heart study
Speaker 1: and UM, it was a study that was actually spearheaded
Speaker 1: out of my home institution, my former home institution, Bring
Speaker 1: Them In Women's Hospital, which is one of the premier
Speaker 1: Harvard teaching institutions. And it was that study that really
Speaker 1: sparked the movement to make a change at the NIH.
Speaker 1: And in fact, it was a group of legislators, women
Speaker 1: legislators that came into Congress on the heels of the
Speaker 1: Clarence Thomas Anita Hill hearings. It was kind of the
Speaker 1: first year of the woman and they recognized it was
Speaker 1: when that study was published that they recognized it had
Speaker 1: only been done in men, and this spurred them on
Speaker 1: to actually um work to get this legislation passed in
Speaker 1: NIH Revitalization Act. So, you know, I think it's important
Speaker 1: on a couple of levels, which is not only is
Speaker 1: the representation of women UM important in science. And when
Speaker 1: I say women, I'm talking here about women in trials,
Speaker 1: but also UM, women in pre clinical trials, female cells,
Speaker 1: and female animals in all types of research. But representation
Speaker 1: matters UM in all sectors because imagine if we didn't
Speaker 1: have that year the woman and we didn't have that
Speaker 1: whole cohort of women elected to Congress, we might have
Speaker 1: really it might have been another who knows, twenty years
Speaker 1: before that legislation had been passed. And you know, fast forward.
Speaker 1: Guess what when the trial was done and it wasn't
Speaker 1: that long ago, maybe ten years ago or so tip
Speaker 1: fifteen years ago the trial that looked at the impact
Speaker 1: of low dose aspirin for preventing heart attacks and women.
Speaker 1: Guess what the impact is different? Low dose aspirin is
Speaker 1: only impactful for women over the age of six, and
Speaker 1: it mainly prevents stroke, not heart attack. Interesting, so there
Speaker 1: is a fundamental difference. We don't understand the mechanism and
Speaker 1: the why. There's still a lot of work to do,
Speaker 1: but you know, we have, uh, those women in Congress
Speaker 1: and Pat Schroeder was really one of the leaders Representative Schroeder.
Speaker 1: So I think it's a great story. It's a great story,
Speaker 1: and it is um something that is as important today
Speaker 1: as it was when we were first getting into this.
Speaker 1: So um Dr Johnson went to becoming president Johnson, what
Speaker 1: was it like? How did you make the change from
Speaker 1: being in medicine so deeply to the academy. Not that
Speaker 1: they're unrelated, but it must have been something you thought
Speaker 1: long and hard about before you made the change. Oh absolutely, Um.
Speaker 1: You know, I've been in academic medicine. I was a
Speaker 1: professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, and I was
Speaker 1: also a professor of epidemiology at the Harvard School of
Speaker 1: Public Health. And you know, kind of fast forward for years.
Speaker 1: Who would have thought that that background would have been
Speaker 1: as helpful as it is today in the middle of
Speaker 1: a pandemic UM. But you know, initially, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I was quite happy and we were doing really excellent
Speaker 1: work UM in the in academic medicine UM. And you know,
Speaker 1: the opportunity came to begin to think about came to
Speaker 1: me to think about higher education, and I thought obviously
Speaker 1: long and hard UM about it. And you know, when
Speaker 1: you enter a process like this, you you enter it
Speaker 1: with a tremendous amount of exploration and of course interest.
Speaker 1: But I would say that as the process moved on,
Speaker 1: it became more and more convinced that this UM really
Speaker 1: was an important next step UM in my career and
Speaker 1: in my life, and that the again that through line
Speaker 1: of improving the lives of women in advancing women that
Speaker 1: um that this could now be taken to a different
Speaker 1: environment with a different mission, but one that was equally powerful. UM.
Speaker 1: And I think you know, for me, Wellesley College, given
Speaker 1: my work and women's health, was was a very powerful draw.
Speaker 1: So it hasn't been you know, as large of a
Speaker 1: jump in terms of of course, medicine is different from
Speaker 1: higher ed, but I think the the academic part has
Speaker 1: has a lot of similarities. And I would just also
Speaker 1: add that I think as we um think about bringing
Speaker 1: an ethic of care to this environment, UM that when
Speaker 1: we think about the fact that the recognition for students that,
Speaker 1: like everyone thrive when they're fully seen for who they are,
Speaker 1: I think is a direct connection to my work in medicine,
Speaker 1: and that as I've worked with this younger cohort of women, it's,
Speaker 1: to be honest, just a lot of fun. The faculty
Speaker 1: of phenomenal I'm learning a tremendous amount and the the
Speaker 1: young women who are not yet formed. They don't exactly
Speaker 1: know what they're doing yet, they don't know what they
Speaker 1: want to do, or they think they might know, but
Speaker 1: things change. It's an exciting time of life. With a
Speaker 1: lot of opportunity as well as with many many challenges,
Speaker 1: and to lead a college um and really see both
Speaker 1: the discovery and with regard to the research, but to
Speaker 1: see young people, young women in particular, grow and develop.
Speaker 1: It is It's both an honor and such a joy
Speaker 1: and the rewards of being a mentor. Absolutely Seneca has
Speaker 1: one hundred women to hear will be back after the
Speaker 1: short break. Well I happen to know firsthand that you're
Speaker 1: doing just an exceptional job at Wellesley, and so many
Speaker 1: people comment on it favorably. I've often wondered what the
Speaker 1: secret sauce of Wellesley is. I happen to know two
Speaker 1: of the three female secretaries of State who went to Wellesley,
Speaker 1: so one college produced two of the three U s
Speaker 1: Secretaries of State. I used to ask them if it
Speaker 1: was the water at Wellesley or what it was, because, uh,
Speaker 1: there is something about Wellesley and women's leadership that really
Speaker 1: has impact. Well Milan, You're you're you're so right, and
Speaker 1: I just want to say, uh, both for Secretary Albright
Speaker 1: and Secretary Clinton, that um, they are just um you know, uh,
Speaker 1: we are so proud of them and and so many
Speaker 1: of our alumni who are in public life, who are
Speaker 1: in civic life. It's truly remarkable. UM. I also want
Speaker 1: to say that we take credit for all three women
Speaker 1: who have been Secretaries of State, and I'll tell you why.
Speaker 1: It's because Secretary Albright's father was a mentor to Condoleeza Rice.
Speaker 1: So I think we have a right to to take
Speaker 1: I think we have a right to take credit for
Speaker 1: all three. Um. But but in all seriousness, UM, I
Speaker 1: think that you know, it's often assumed in terms of
Speaker 1: Wellesley's founding that it came into being simply because women
Speaker 1: lacked opportunity, you know, for higher for higher education in
Speaker 1: the late eighteen hundreds. But there was really a different
Speaker 1: compelling vision for Wellesley by its founderis it was for
Speaker 1: democracy and equal opportunity. And Pauline and Henry Durant, who
Speaker 1: were are founders, UM, they really felt strongly the nation's
Speaker 1: future could only be secured through vastly expanded access to
Speaker 1: childhood education and that future would require teachers, UM. And
Speaker 1: that they founded the college to not only produce teachers
Speaker 1: to impact democracy in the next generation. But they also
Speaker 1: founded Wellesley on the premise that women uh needed um
Speaker 1: the highest quality and rigorous education UH, and also that
Speaker 1: there was this combination of mind and body that they
Speaker 1: focused on in terms of UH being physically fit as
Speaker 1: well as as that really impacting UM, your your intellectual performance.
Speaker 1: So it's it's just I think it's it's really a
Speaker 1: uniquely empowering environment for women. I mean, it's one of
Speaker 1: the few places on Earth where the buildings, the quads,
Speaker 1: the programs, they're all they all bear the name of women. UM.
Speaker 1: Wellesley has always had women leadership UM, and our faculty
Speaker 1: is fifty women. And that is in many of the fields,
Speaker 1: in all the fields that have underrepresentation of women, like economics,
Speaker 1: like the STEM fields, particularly computer science, the quantity tative areas.
Speaker 1: So our young women are able to see themselves and
Speaker 1: they're able to imagine and to dream from a very
Speaker 1: early phase of life. And I think in this they
Speaker 1: have learned how to take on leadership UM and they've
Speaker 1: done it very powerfully. And the question always comes, well
Speaker 1: does that really inhibit you in the next phase when
Speaker 1: you are with men, And the answer is no. What
Speaker 1: it does is create a very strong foundation that I
Speaker 1: think then allows you to launch UM really into into
Speaker 1: the future. Well, I've certainly seen that in all of
Speaker 1: the younger women in particular who I've been privileged to
Speaker 1: work with over the years. They have that sense of
Speaker 1: having been empowered and have confidence and certainly the capacity
Speaker 1: to do the work that they are engaged in. You know,
Speaker 1: single sex higher education has been controversial in some quarters. Uh,
Speaker 1: and it's obviously not for everybody, but there are so
Speaker 1: many benefits, UM. You described some of them. Do you
Speaker 1: want to expand on that a little bit? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think that, UM. You know, we are I think right
Speaker 1: now in our country, UM and in the world at
Speaker 1: a threshold moment for women's leadership, and UM. You know,
Speaker 1: I think there's been advancement, but there are also places
Speaker 1: where women's rights are at stake in ways that we
Speaker 1: wouldn't have imagined, UM. And so you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: interesting that the need for or women leaders UM, women
Speaker 1: leaders who we know from the data and I know,
Speaker 1: millenniare you are so focused rightfully, so on what is
Speaker 1: the proof? What is the evidence that we look at,
Speaker 1: and we know that women's leadership UM is so impactful
Speaker 1: both at the local level, at the state level, at
Speaker 1: the at the country level. And that's I'm here now
Speaker 1: talking internationally. UM. So the need to really uh produce
Speaker 1: not only strong women and women who lead with ethics, um,
Speaker 1: but the need to also represent as an institution that
Speaker 1: type of leadership I think is critical. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: it's it's interesting because most of our students are a
Speaker 1: majority of our students come to us, come to Wellesley
Speaker 1: because we are an outstanding liberal arts college. And but
Speaker 1: you know, when they arrive and when they access the
Speaker 1: curriculum in ways that are truly liberating with you know,
Speaker 1: if you look at two of our most popular majors
Speaker 1: are economics and neuroscience, with computer science rapidly growing as well.
Speaker 1: What I would say is that by the time they're
Speaker 1: leaving Wellesley, they are convinced that having this opportunity in
Speaker 1: in this environment has been liberating. And um, you know,
Speaker 1: I would say that it is truly this mindset that
Speaker 1: is uh fostered fostered at Wellesley. So, um, it's a
Speaker 1: you know, as we move forward, you know what is
Speaker 1: the next level. The next level is to make sure
Speaker 1: that all of the young women on our campus, whatever
Speaker 1: their background, we are need blind and we're very proud
Speaker 1: of that, whatever their background, whatever whether their first generation
Speaker 1: or if they're underrepresented minorities, um or have a very
Speaker 1: significant financial challenges, that they have a strong sense of belonging,
Speaker 1: that they have a strong sense of their ability to flourish,
Speaker 1: and that when they leave, they have a strong sense
Speaker 1: of not only their possibility, but also their civic duties
Speaker 1: and their duty to kind of passing it on in
Speaker 1: the world. And what I would say that is, um
Speaker 1: I think it's very powerful and really a characteristic of Wellesley,
Speaker 1: but I think also a characteristic of of women's colleges. Well,
Speaker 1: it's certainly something that you inculcate which is then manifested
Speaker 1: in your graduate It's and i and and liberating as
Speaker 1: well as empowering. I remember one Wellesley alumna saying to me, well,
Speaker 1: nobody was there to tell us we didn't belong in
Speaker 1: science or math, so you just you know, you took off.
Speaker 1: That's right, and and really did well, you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's you know, at Wellesley and as students find the
Speaker 1: confidence that comes from practicing their own leadership and their
Speaker 1: own leadership that is not constrained and that I think
Speaker 1: really develops a strength that uh that is I do
Speaker 1: think um unparalleled. Let me go back to something we're
Speaker 1: all dealing with today, and that is COVID. It seems
Speaker 1: to be an omnipresence um everywhere, and I wonder what
Speaker 1: its impact has been at Wellesley. I presume that your
Speaker 1: work as a physician has really been called upon in
Speaker 1: terms of decisions you've been making at the college. How
Speaker 1: are you responding students on campus? How are you coping
Speaker 1: with all of this? I would say that you're right
Speaker 1: about my background in medicine and public health being of
Speaker 1: value and being in the same city in which I
Speaker 1: was in academic medicine, which really has allowed UM allowed
Speaker 1: me to tap into a number of resources. But but
Speaker 1: I'm let me just begin by talking about higher ed
Speaker 1: in Massachusetts because I think it's really a model for
Speaker 1: the country, and I'm so proud of to be part
Speaker 1: of this higher education community because what we did was
Speaker 1: we really came together as a community and worked together
Speaker 1: on behalf of all of us. It wasn't just those
Speaker 1: who are well endowed versus those who are not. We
Speaker 1: really worked together to one developed the evidence space protocols
Speaker 1: based on the best science. Actually, we met weekly with
Speaker 1: Richelle Dr of Rochelle Wilenski, who's going to be the
Speaker 1: new head of the CDC, and she was really on
Speaker 1: the cutting edge of of developing the the models for
Speaker 1: how we should think about asymptomatic or surveillance testing. So
Speaker 1: we really had the best minds in the room and
Speaker 1: we worked together to create and make available the opportunity
Speaker 1: for all schools who wanted to participate to participate in UH.
Speaker 1: First of all, our testing protocol, which we had a
Speaker 1: very strong partnership with the Broad Institute, which is one
Speaker 1: of the world's leading genomic institutes, and they set up
Speaker 1: a whole testing UH operation UM and our work with
Speaker 1: them really led to being able to do this kind
Speaker 1: of testing UM at a much lower price. And again
Speaker 1: this was available to all of higher ed UM. So
Speaker 1: I think it's it's a time when the community has
Speaker 1: come together UM and along with the Broad UM made
Speaker 1: it possible for all of us to do what we
Speaker 1: initially thought might be impossible. So that's that's the first
Speaker 1: lesson UM of of collaboration UM. The second is that
Speaker 1: you know, as we decided at Wellesley what to do,
Speaker 1: we do have half of our students on campus with
Speaker 1: a lot of different protocols, behavior protocols, mask wearing, physical
Speaker 1: distancing all types of cleaning protocols, classrooms redone. You know,
Speaker 1: a lot of investment UM. But I think what we've
Speaker 1: been able to do in higher read when you follow
Speaker 1: the science is show what's possible. Um Our rates of
Speaker 1: COVID on campus have been quite low. UM. We've had
Speaker 1: fourteen cases the entire semester, and each of them not
Speaker 1: all of them in students UM and I think that
Speaker 1: it really took an entire community coming together to make
Speaker 1: this happen. The other thing that the pandemic I think
Speaker 1: is really brought to light is you know that the
Speaker 1: residential experience is a great equalizer. You know, about half
Speaker 1: of our students are studying in person and the other
Speaker 1: half are studying remotely, and we've had to find ways
Speaker 1: to ensure equity and excellence no matter where our students are.
Speaker 1: And our faculty have been just phenomenal, and they've really
Speaker 1: embraced this commitment and the challenge that that they've been
Speaker 1: faced with. So, you know, I think it's made us
Speaker 1: even appreciate more the fact that when we bring our
Speaker 1: students to campus that they were all living in the
Speaker 1: in place they're doing and eating in the same dining halls.
Speaker 1: It's a tremendous learning experience, but it's such an important
Speaker 1: part of the educational experience, and we've had to find
Speaker 1: other ways to create that connection and community. UM. So
Speaker 1: it's it's been a fascinating journey. Uh. And again I
Speaker 1: just um, I wish some of our country, where we
Speaker 1: now see the virus raging um could use the science
Speaker 1: in the way that Higher Read, that much of Higher
Speaker 1: Read has used the science to drive practice. I want
Speaker 1: to end our wonderful conversation with the question I like
Speaker 1: to ask these days, because people are feeling kind of
Speaker 1: down and a little bit worried about the future, given
Speaker 1: all that's happening in our world, what makes you optimistic? Oh?
Speaker 1: You know, I always have to say, in terms of
Speaker 1: optimism under wonder whatever conditions that when you're the president
Speaker 1: of a college or university, no matter what the issues
Speaker 1: of the day, and some of them can be, you know,
Speaker 1: quite difficult on any given day or every any given year,
Speaker 1: that this is this is essentially optimistic work because it
Speaker 1: is about the future. It is about our future in
Speaker 1: terms of our young people, and it's about our future
Speaker 1: in terms of the scholarship the research produced. So just
Speaker 1: that is to me, I am in an optimistic environment. UM.
Speaker 1: But with that being said, you know, it is a
Speaker 1: daunting moment um. We really I think of ourselves as
Speaker 1: facing three three pandemics UM, COVID, racism, UM and economic inequality.
Speaker 1: And UM. I think that over these past you know,
Speaker 1: six to nine months that we you've seen we've seen
Speaker 1: some devastating things, but we've also seen encouraging signs that
Speaker 1: people are rising up to really combat these ills and
Speaker 1: to try to bring a better world to the four
Speaker 1: you know, I would say, look at this year's election,
Speaker 1: we saw tremendous civic engagement across our country, with record
Speaker 1: turnouts in a pandemic at the polls, obviously with expanded
Speaker 1: voting options. I mean, it is it is ultimately a
Speaker 1: very strong sign for democracy. You know, we've also seen
Speaker 1: powerful and often constructive activism. I've seen it on campus,
Speaker 1: but we haven't witnessed this kind of I think powerful
Speaker 1: activism in the country since the Civil rights movement. And UM,
Speaker 1: I think that is again it's about engagement and looking
Speaker 1: to a better world. UM. And uh, you know, there's
Speaker 1: been also tremendous I mean, obviously there's been tremendous hurt
Speaker 1: and pain through this time, but there's also been innovation
Speaker 1: and people showing resilience UM and uh and and a
Speaker 1: power that UM that I think is is very very hopeful.
Speaker 1: So you know, I am optimistic. I think there's a
Speaker 1: lot to be, a lot of work to do, but
Speaker 1: the fact that we're waking up in new ways UM
Speaker 1: and I see it all around me gives me just
Speaker 1: great hope for for the future. It's been a joy
Speaker 1: to be with you and and really to touch the
Speaker 1: depths of your thinking and to learn so much from
Speaker 1: you as I always do, and I know our listeners
Speaker 1: have today. So thanks for taking the time to be
Speaker 1: with us. It's really been great. Well, Ambassador Revere, thank
Speaker 1: you for everything that you've done and everything that you
Speaker 1: continue to do. Dr Paula Johnson always inspires as a
Speaker 1: leader in health care and education. Here are three things
Speaker 1: that resonated with me from that conversation. First, Dr Johnson's
Speaker 1: groundbreaking research reminds us why we need to put a
Speaker 1: women's lens on healthcare. The fact is that medical conditions
Speaker 1: show up differently for women and men, and medications affect
Speaker 1: the sexes differently, which means that women need to be
Speaker 1: included in all aspects of medicine, including research leadership and
Speaker 1: clinical trials. Second, Dr Johnson's life exemplifies the value of mentorship.
Speaker 1: She credits her own role models, her mother, her grandmother,
Speaker 1: and Professor Ruth Hubbard for inspiring hur towards success. Finally,
Speaker 1: Dr Johnson shows that women can flourish in feels like economics, neuroscience,
Speaker 1: and computer science. Those are among the most popular majors
Speaker 1: at Wellesley. There was nobody there to tell the women
Speaker 1: they didn't belong. Tune in next Tuesday to hear about
Speaker 1: our next featured woman and discover why she's one of
Speaker 1: Seneca's one Women to Hear. Seneca's one hundred Women to
Speaker 1: Hear is a collaboration between the Seneca Women Podcast Network
Speaker 1: and I Heart Radio, with support from founding partner PNG
Speaker 1: Have a Great Day.