VCU news

By Malorie Burkett

Bon Secours has donated $250,000 to Virginia Commonwealth University’s Department of Health Administration to endow a new professorship.

The purpose of the Bon Secours Professorship in Health Administration will be to recruit and retain a distinguished faculty member within VCU’s Department of Health Administration in the School of Allied Health Professions.

"Endowed professorships are the key in retaining as well as attracting the top faculty in the country,” said Stephen Mick, Ph.D., chair in Health Administration. “This extraordinary gift is precisely the gesture that not only helps the department move toward the top of all such programs in the country but also shields the department from the uncertainties of state budgets and tuition income.”

Ranked by U.S. News & World Report among the nation's top five health administration programs, the VCU Masters of Health Administration program is one of the oldest in the country.

The professorship will be funded over a three-year period with contributions from Bon Secours Richmond Health System, Bon Secours Hampton Roads Health System and Bon Secours Health System, Inc.

"Bon Secours has a strong history of supporting the department and giving to its communities,” said Sister Patricia A. Eck, chair, Bon Secours Health System. “We recognize the importance of developing strong future leaders for not for profit, faith-based health care and are very pleased to support distinguished faculty who will have such a pivotal role in developing and preparing women and men as future leaders within health care.”

Bon Secours Health System, Inc. is a national Catholic health care system with a healing ministry that serves 12 communities in nine states throughout the eastern United States. Bon Secours Richmond Health System is a member of Bon Secours Health System, Inc. For more information, visit www.bonsecours.org/bshsi.