Bonita "Bonnie" Stanton, M.D., vice dean for Research, is leaving the Wayne State University School of Medicine to become the founding dean of the new medical school at Seton Hall University.
Dr. Stanton, who has served as vice dean for Research since August 2011, begins her new position March 9.
In June 2015, Seton Hall and Hackensack University Health Network signed an agreement to form a new four-year school of medicine. The school, New Jersey's fifth, is scheduled to open in the fall of 2018.
"The long-range committed partnership between Seton Hall University and Hackensack - Meridian Healthcare System to the vision of inter-professional health care primary and secondary community-based preventive care and seamless continuity through hospital-based tertiary care" attracted Dr. Stanton to the deanship. "Their belief in the importance of patient-centered, innovative care that explicitly seeks to reach all persons through formats appropriate to their values, race, age, gender and socioeconomic status, and the fact that this is a new medical school allowing -- indeed requiring -- a fresh approach to curriculum and research development offered a new challenge."
Before she was appointed vice dean for Research, Dr. Stanton served as the Schotanus Professor and Chair of Pediatrics for the Wayne State University School of Medicine, and pediatrician-in-chief at Children's Hospital of Michigan. She chaired the WSU Department of Pediatrics since joining the School of Medicine in 2002.
"For many, Dr. Stanton wrote the book in the field of Pediatrics," Dean Jack D. Sobel, M.D., said in announcing Dr. Stanton's resignation Feb. 24. "She has built an outstanding reputation as a pediatrician's pediatrician, both in clinical service and in pediatric research. While we will miss her dearly, I know that Dr. Stanton will develop an outstanding medical education and research program for Seton Hall's new school."
Dr. Stanton's studies have been extensively funded and widely published in many journals of note. She chaired a National Institutes of Health study section on AIDS and related research, and served as a study committee member of the National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, and an advisory member of the National Institutes of Health's Fogarty International Center. She has served in critical research advisory roles and related capacities for numerous respected institutions in addition to the NIH, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the World Health Organization, the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research, the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the United Nations Children's Fund, the Association of American Medical Colleges and the American Academy of Pediatrics.
A past president of the Association of Medical School Pediatric Department Chairs, Dr. Stanton is a member of the Research Training, Education and Career Development Working Group for the Wayne State University Clinical and Translational Science Award. In 2007 she chaired the Children's Research Center of Michigan Strategic Planning Commission. From 2004 to 2007 she was vice president of the Foundation for Medical Research and Education. At West Virginia University, she chaired the School of Medicine Strategic Planning Advisory Board of Research and the Clinical Studies Internal Grant Program.
Dr. Stanton received her bachelor's degree in 1972 from Wellesley College and her medical degree cum laude from the Yale University School of Medicine in 1976. She performed residencies at University Hospitals of Cleveland and at Yale University School of Medicine, where she completed a fellowship in infectious diseases.
She served as staff scientist and director of the Urban Volunteer Program for the International Center for Diarrheal Disease Research and World Bank from 1983 to 1986 in Bangladesh. For an additional two years, she was appointed the World Bank's maternal child health specialist in Bangladesh. She later joined the University of Maryland, where she served as professor, division chief and vice chair of Pediatrics, and director of the Center for Minority Health Research. She was the chair of Pediatrics at West Virginia University from 1999 until joining the WSU School of Medicine in 2002.
"I'm going to miss the wonderful faculty and staff, and our residents and students," Dr. Stanton said. "It has been a joy to work under the leadership of Jack Sobel."
Her last day with the School of Medicine will be March 8.