Pharmacy's State of the College Address Touched on Its 'Global' Reputation

In his third annual State of the College address since arriving in 2013, Neil MacKinnon, PhD, dean and professor in the James L. Winkle College of Pharmacy, spoke before faculty, staff and students on Oct. 19 to highlight a year of achievements. The address was also an opportunity for MacKinnon to distribute the college's recently published 2016 Dean's Annual Report. 

"People are starting to get to know our college on a global level," MacKinnon informed the group, citing the college's many accomplishments, including a recent meeting of the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP) where almost a dozen Winkle College of Pharmacy faculty attended and many of whom hold leadership positions within FIP or presented research to their international colleagues. 

This type of leadership presence, he said, is representative of the college's new strategic plan: "We Are Pharmacy: Rx for the Future" with a vision statement to "lead-care-transform" pharmacy/pharmaceutical education, practice and research. 

Toward this goal, he stated, that the college has also: 

• Completed Phase 1 of the $34 million renovation to Kowalewski Hall, with the entire project scheduled to be completed in summer 2017.
• Launched a new online Pharmacy Leadership graduate program, the first program of its kind in the country
• Increased student enrollment over three consecutive years, with a record number of under-represented minorities.
• Added 12 new faculty in the past two years, 11 of which are in newly created positions. 
• Seen a 51 percent increase in research funding over the past year
• Increased donor engagement, with a record number of donors and $1.85 million in donations for fiscal year 2016. 
• Achieved a surplus in three consecutive years in performance-based budget, with another surplus forecasted for the current fiscal year.

"While there is still much work to be done and we can always improve and do better, we've made significant progress over the past three years in all of our key performance metrics," MacKinnon says. "I'm confident that our new strategic plan will enable us to lead and transform pharmacy and pharmaceutical education, practice and research."