N.C. A&T Dean Campbell Named to State Health Equity Task Force

EAST GREENSBORO, N.C. (July 30, 2020) – Lenora R. Campbell, Ph.D., dean of the North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University College of Health and Human Sciences (CHHS), has been named a member of the newly established Andrea Harris Social, Economic, Environmental, and Health Equity Task Force.

The task force’s 35 members are charged with addressing the social, environmental, economic, and health disparities in communities of color that have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Its first meeting is anticipated in early August.

Campbell joins the task force as the North Carolina historically Black college or university representative. She has more than 30 years of experience in higher education and serves as a member of the Moses Cone Health System Board of Trustees.

“Inequities in North Carolina are not new, but COVID-19 is shining a bright light on disparities that have gone unchecked in our health care and economic institutions for communities of color,” said Gov. Roy Cooper. “This task force is the right way to address these inequities as we recover from the pandemic so that as we come back from this, we improve access to affordable healthcare and quality economic opportunities.”

As CHHS dean, Campbell provides oversight for seven academic disciplines: nursing, social work, psychology, sociology, kinesiology, health communications, and health services management. She leads the college’s mission to be responsive to changing health and workforce needs locally, regionally, nationally and globally by preparing graduates who are highly regarded and sought-after by employers and academic institutions for their ability to address critical health and human needs, with an eye toward equity, access and justice.

Under Campbell’s leadership, the A&T’s School of Nursing recently received a $3.25 million award from the Health Resources and Services Administration that will be used to produce nursing graduates who are committed to health equity, eliminating health disparities, and serving medically underserved populations.

“Health inequities are the result of more than individual choice or random occurrence – they are the result of the historic and ongoing interplay of inequitable structures, policies, and norms that shape lives,” said N.C. Department of Administration Secretary Machelle Sanders.

Campbell has presented and published widely in areas related to health disparities, child health, mental health and custodial grandparent families. In 2012, she was appointed to the National Advisory Council in Nurse Education and Practice of the Health Resources and Service Administration of the Department of Health and Human Services.

Before joining A&T as its interim CHHS dean in 2016 and assuming the role permanently in 2018, Campbell spent eight years as associate dean and director in the Division of Nursing at Winston-Salem State University, where she oversaw the bachelor’s, masters and doctor of nursing practice programs. She also served in faculty positions in nursing at Winston Salem State and the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, held positions in nursing practice and established an interdisciplinary program for custodial grandparents, funded by the WK Kellogg Foundation, the Department of Human and Health Services, and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina.

Campbell holds a B.S.N. from Florida A&M University, M.S.N. from the University of Maryland Baltimore and Ph.D. from the University of Alabama Birmingham.

Four other Greensboro residents were named to the task force to serve as at-large members, including C2 Contractors LLC owner and CEO C.C. Lambeth, a founder of A&T’s Board of Visitors. Lambeth is joined by Charlene Green, M.D., an anesthesiologist at Cone Health; Catherine Harvey Sevier, Dr.PH, managing director at The Generations Study Group LLC and adjunct professor of public health at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro; and the Rev. Dr. Anthony Spearman, an ordained minister with the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church and North Carolina NAACP president. State Rep. Donny Lambeth of Winston-Salem is the only other Triad resident serving on the task force, also as a member at-large.