Johns Hopkins understands the impact that evidenced-based research can have — and provides tools and support to scientists, clinicians, and investigators to explore their questions and focus areas. But what happens next? The opening of the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center in Washington, D.C., exemplifies our institution’s commitment to the crucial next steps: policy changes, public impact, and global dialogue. Appropriately housed in this location, in addition to offices in Baltimore, is the Center for Gun Violence Solutions.
As its tagline “Research Drives Solutions to Save Lives” indicates, the Center for Gun Violence Solutions at the Bloomberg School of Public Health focuses on both research and advocacy work, and it’s the first of its kind to do so.
The center celebrated its two-year anniversary on April 10 at the Hopkins Bloomberg Center with a wide variety of gun violence prevention champions. Advisory board members invited their friends and family to share the incredible impact of the center and increase awareness of its mission. The evening’s program shared the center’s progress toward its bold goal to reduce gun violence by 30% by 2030: 30 by 30. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., delivered remarks, celebrating the center’s “incredibly important and groundbreaking mixture of research and advocacy.”
The Center for Gun Violence Solutions launched in April 2022 through a merger of the D.C.-based Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence with the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Prevention and Policy.
Since the merger, the advisory board has grown to 19 dedicated members. Before the anniversary celebration, the board met to discuss future plans and how to maintain its momentum and significant progress, notably the launch of the center’s new website, which expands its digital platform to provide gun violence prevention information, training, and tools to save lives.
As with all of Johns Hopkins advisory boards, members of the Center for Gun Violence Solutions board bring their unique experiences, skills, and networks to help advance the mission of the center. Although the board members have varying backgrounds, many of them, as well as several of the center’s faculty and staff members, have something in common: They have been directly impacted by gun violence. This shared personal experience propels the board to fuel innovative research and solutions to save lives and prevent gun injuries and deaths.
Advisory Board Co-chair Pamela Hoehn-Saric shares, “I can’t think of a better way to commemorate my beautiful sister, Dana Feitler, whose life was taken by gun violence on the streets of Chicago at the age of 24.”
The board’s top priority is to help the center expand its work to identify and advance solutions to gun violence and achieve its goal of reducing gun violence by 30% by 2030.
Visit the Center for Gun Violence Solutions website for more information. If you have any questions regarding the center’s work, email amandamyers@jhu.edu.
Topics: Alumni, Faculty and Staff, Foundations, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Promote and Protect Health