Dialogue Authors 
John W. Seavey
John W. Seavey is the Everett B. Sackett Professor in the College of Health and Human Services and a Faculty Fellow in the Carsey Institute at UNH. He teaches courses in health policy at the undergraduate and graduate levels. His research focus has been on rural health care and more recently the role of socioeconomic status and health and disparities in health care. He has been the recipient of the School of Health & Human Services Teacher of the Year Award (1986), UNH Outstanding Associate Professor Award (1991), UNH Bill Kidder Faculty Award (1999), College of Health and Human Services Distinguished Career Research Award (2003), UNH Faculty Social Justice Award (2005), and the UNH Distinguished Professor Award (2005). As chair of the General Education Study Committee he put forth the idea of a UNH Dialogue Series, which has since been adopted by the University. He has participated in the past three Dialogue Series, Democracy, Poverty, and Health. His hobby is architectural/landscape photography.
Dialogue Essay: Building the Foundation for a Healthy Life: Individuals, Communities and the State
Josephine Porter
Jo Porter, MPH, is the deputy director for the NH Institute for Health Policy and Practice. She is responsible for overall management of the CDC Assessment Initiative grant, a joint project with the NH Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and operational oversight across NHIHPP projects. Ms. Porter works specifically on the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) and performance measures focal areas of the CDC AI. She has 10 years of health care-related data analysis, project management, and program development experience.
Jo earned her undergraduate degree, Summa Cum Laude, from UNH with a major in Microbiology and a minor in Health Management and Policy. She earned her Masters of Public Health with honors from Boston University, with dual concentrations in epidemiology/biostatistics and social/behavioral health.
She lives in Nottingham with her two young children (Jayden, 3, and Seth, 1) and her husband, Andrew. She personal interests include cooking, gardening, and the Red Sox.
Dialogue Essay: Building the Foundation for a Healthy Life: Individuals, Communities and the State
Barbara Arrington
Barbara Arrington is the dean of the College of Health and Human Services. She brings extensive experience in academic leadership and program development. Her scholarship is in the fields of health policy, strategic management, and health care quality. Her term at the University of New Hampshire commenced in September 2007, and like other UNH deans, she will serve a five-year, renewable appointment.
Arrington is actively involved in community service and consultation. She is a frequent site visitor for the Council on Education for Public Health, the accrediting body for schools of public health. Included in her community service activities are more than 15 years of governance experience in health care organizations, 11 of those in hospital and health system governance. She also consults in the areas of organizational strategy and leadership development. Her clients have included the public health institutes of Florida and Missouri, the Missouri Foundation for Health, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, the National Association of Community Health Centers, consulting firms, Catholic heal care systems, state and local health departments, academic medical centers, health maintenance organizations, professional associations, religious congregations, and nurse executives.
Arrington’s undergraduate degree in nursing is from Columbia University, her master’s degree in public health (health administration) is from the University of Missouri-Columbia, and her doctorate in health services research is from Saint Louis University (1985). She is a fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives.
Dialogue Essay: Building the Foundation for a Healthy Life: Individuals, Communities and the State
Gale Carey
Gale Carey is a native of Natick, MA. Despite a solid bat and strong throwing arm as a teen, she was not drafted by the Boston Red Sox, so turned to her second love: science. She earned a BS in Biochemistry from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, a MS in Nutritional Sciences from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and a PhD in Nutrition from the University of California, Davis. After two years in private industry and six years at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, returned to New England in 1989 and has been a faculty member in the Nutritional Sciences program at the University of New Hampshire ever since.
She has published numerous research articles, reviews and book chapters, and presented research findings at conferences nationally and internationally. She was awarded the Outstanding Advisor in the College of Life Sciences and Agriculture in 1994, was a visiting scholar at the Copenhagen Muscle Research Centre in 1997, and received the Jean A. Brierley Teaching Excellence Award in 2005. Her hobbies include music, yoga, travel, bird watching and, of course, baseball. She lives in Durham with her husband George, daughter Sarah, son Matt, father Jim, dog Tucker and cat Jasmine.
Dialogue Essay: Dodge this: do environmental chemicals impact your health?
Russell Carr
I grew up in Syracuse, NY and went west to start my chemical engineering training at Brigham Young University in 1974. I graduated with a BS in chemical engineering in 1980, having a break from school to serve as missionary in Belgium and France. I decided to come back east and earned a PhD in chemical engineering from the University of Rochester in 1984. Although my degree is in chemical engineering, all of my research was done at the Strong Memorial Hospital at the Medical Center. I have been a member of the chemical engineering faculty at UNH since fall 1984.
I regularly teach Applied Mathematics for Chemical Engineers and Advanced Fluid Mechanics and have taught over a dozen different chemical engineering courses. In 2004, I started teaching a new course in Biomedical Engineering. My research in microvascular blood flow has been funded by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. I have supervised 9 graduate students at UNH. Several of them are still active in bioengineering work. Dr. Fu Wen Rong is currently Professor of Food Engineering at National Taiwan Ocean University. Dr. Gary Lee Bowlin is Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Virginia Commonwealth University. Dr. Jewen Xiao is a member of the Structures Research Group at the National Center for Biotechnology Information at the National Library of Medicine. Dr. Fan Wu is currently working at eh Biotechnology and Bioengineering Center of the Medical College of Wisconsin.
During my association with UNH, I have been able to take advantage of some of the many educational opportunities here. I have taken classes in photomicrography, hematology, phlebotomy, statistical physics, nonlinear dynamics, beginning Russian and violin making. I have also taken courses in Computational Biofluids (University of Pittsburgh Super Computing Center) and Tissue Engineering (Rice University).
Outside UNH, I’ve been a Boy Scout leader for over twenty years. I try to play viola with my family string "orchestra" and have been violist and librarian with the Portsmouth Symphony Orchestra (community music group). I am very happily married for thirty years to Teresa and we are parents to 10 children ranging from age 4 to 28. Here’s to our health!
Dialogue Essay: Can We Engineer Our Way to Good Health?
Michele Dillon
Michele Dillon, Ph.D., is a professor of sociology and department chair. Her research interests span religion and culture, community participation, life-course transitions, and the moral politics surrounding abortion and same-sex relationships. At UNH, she teachers core courses in sociological theory and research. Her books include Catholic Identity: Balancing Reason, Faith, and Power (Cambridge University Press, 1999), In the Course of a Lifetime: Tracing Religious Belief, Practice and Change (University of California Press, 2007), Debating Divorce: Moral Conflict in Ireland (University Press of Kentucky, 1993), Handbook of the Sociology of Religion (editor; Cambridge University Press, 2003). Dr. Dillon is active in the American Sociological Association and is currently President of the Association for the Sociology of Religion. Married with two teenage boys, she is pleased to have completed two marathons when she was in her 20s, but now likes to walk and bike in her free time.
Dialogue Essay: Is It Good To Do Good? Altruism and Health
Richard French
Dr. Richard French is a veterinary pathologist and director of the New Hampshire Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory. He came to the University of New Hampshire in the summer of 2008 after serving as a tenured faculty at the University of Connecticut and as a pathologist in the Connecticut Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory. He acquired a DVM from the University of Illinois and went into small animal practice for several years before returning to academics. Dr. French received a Masters in parasitology, a PhD in neuropathology and completed his residency in anatomic pathology. He is a member of the USDA National Animal Health Emergency Response Corp. and serves as a member of the United Nations (UN) Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) as an expert in the Emergency Prevention Systems (EMPRES) for Transboundary Animal and Plant Pests. His primary interests are in emerging zoonotic and transboundary diseases of animal and public health significance. Dr. French has numerous publications in broad fields which includes the first report of West Nile virus in the northern hemisphere (Science, 1999).
Dialogue Essay: War of the Worlds: Our Worlds are Colliding and Infectious Disease is Winning - Emerging Diseases and the One Health Initiative
Carolyn Gamtso
Carolyn Gamtso (Associate Professor/Library Specialist) is the Head of Public Services at the UNH Manchester Library, where she focuses on library instruction and reference services. She earned her BA from the College of the Holy Cross, her MA in English from Indiana University, and her MLIS from the University of Rhode Island.
Professor Gamtso's research interests include information literacy, faculty collaboration, and peer tutoring in the library. She has shared her research in the area of library instruction at local, regional, national, and international conferences. She has also co-authored several articles and a book chapter that discuss information literacy projects and practices. Professor Gamtso’s collection development activities for the UNHM Library reflect her love of literature and cinema: she selects materials for the popular UNH Manchester Audiobook and Film Collections.
From July to December of 2007, Professor Gamtso pursued a long-held dream by spending her academic sabbatical in the foothills of the Himalayas, teaching English to Tibetan refugees in Dharamsala, India, home of the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Government-in-Exile. While in Dharamsala, she put her library skills to good use as well by reorganizing a volunteer organization's community reading room. She has discussed her experiences in India around the state in a UNH Speaker's Bureau lecture entitled "Education in Exile: Teaching in a Tibetan Refugee Community in the Himalayas."
Professor Gamtso enjoys yoga, meditation, hiking, watching films, and reading. A long-time yoga practitioner, she is currently working toward her teaching certification in the Classical Yoga tradition.
Dialogue Essay: Calming the Mind, Healing the Body: Can alternative therapies help college students improve their health?
Patricia A. Halpin
B.S. Biology, Old Dominion U.
M.S. And Ph.D. , Physiology U. Connecticut
Postdoctoral Fellowship at Dartmouth Medical School
After graduating with my undergraduate degree I worked first at Harvard Medical School as a Research Assistant. Then I worked at M.I.T as a Research Technician. My last position there I worked with a Nobel prize winner. It was very exciting and fun work. I have been teaching at UNH-M since 2000. I was the first to offer hybrid online courses at UNH-M. I really enjoy teaching nonscience majors as well as science majors. In my free time during the summer I like to garden. In the winter I ski at Mt. Sunapee.
Dialogue Essay: Too Busy to be Healthy? Join the Club.
Ned Helms
Ned Helms, MA, currently serves as Director of the New Hampshire Institute for Health Policy and Practice, a position he has held since 2001 when he became its founding director. Mr. Helms provides intellectual and administrative leadership for the Institute by overseeing the continued growth and direction of the Institute, investigating and pursuing the development of research and demonstration projects, and facilitating collaborative linkages with health and health policy organizations throughout New Hampshire and New England. As a part of his role at the Institute he also serves as the staff and project director of the Citizens Health Initiative, a position he has held since The Initiative began in September of 2005.
Mr. Helms has over 30 years of experience in New Hampshire health policy and politics. His experience spans the health policy field and includes, serving as: a Legislative and Administrative Assistant for Health Policy within the U. S. Senate, Commissioner of the Department of Health and Human Services for New Hampshire, founder and President of a health policy consulting firm (Helms and Company), and Chief Administrative Officer of Blue Cross/Blue Shield of New Hampshire.
He has a Master of Arts in American Government from the University of New Hampshire.
Dialogue Essay: Discovery: Defining Health and Discovering Progress
Deb Kinghorn
Deborah A. Kinghorn (Deb) has worked as a professional actress and director, and teaches a variety of classes in theatre training, including Acting I, Advanced Acting, Movement and Vocal Production, The Actor’s Voice through Text, Dialects, Period and Style, and Audition Technique. She holds degrees from SUNY at Fredonia (BA,Theatre) and TrinityUniversity through the Dallas Theatre Center (MFA,Theatre, with emphasis in Acting). She has also done a year of intensive study in Acting, Voice and Movement at the Manchester Polytechnic School of Theatre in Manchester, England. She is a member of the Voice and Speech Trainer’s Association (VASTA). She is a Master Teacher of Lessac KinesensicTraining. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Lessac Training and Research Institute and regularly teaches and conducts research at the Lessac Summer Intensive Workshop. She has been the Voice, Dialects and Text coach for over 100 shows in many theatres, including the Alley Theatre in Houston, Texas, the Dallas Theatre Center, the Houston Shakespeare Festival, and Fordham University in NYC. She has directed a wide variety of styles of plays, including Much Ado About Nothing, Lend Me a Tenor, Tartuffe , Macbeth, Kindertransport, The Memory of Water, The Bear, The Proposal, The Last Night of Ballyhoo, A Murder is Announced, and The Servant of Two Masters. Her favorite acting roles include Cecily in The Importance of Being Ernest, Curley’s Wife in Of Mice and Men, and Desdemona in Othello, She received the University of Houston Teaching Excellence Award in 1995 and the Lessac Institute Leadership Award in 2009. Deb presently serves as Chair of the Department of Theatre and Dance at the University of New Hampshire. Her current research involves the Kinesensic training and its connections to the subtle energies of the mind and soul, and its applications to health and wellness.
She loves to sing. She and her husband, Jeff are often seen making fools of themselves over their two mini-dachshunds, General Bonaparte and Mocha.
Dialogue Essay: When You Walk, Do You Feel Like You Are Dancing?
Mary Westfall
The Rev. Dr. Mary E. Westfall is currently Senior Minister at the Community Church of Durham, United Church of Christ, an open and inclusive Christian congregation in the heart of Durham. She is also a University of New Hampshire Chaplain and teaches in the Philosophy Department. With a background in world religions, theology, and contemporary spiritual practices, Mary's interest in the emerging dialogue between religion and science led her to pursue a doctorate at UNH in the Natural Resources Program, completed in 2001. Her commitment to environmental sustainability has been a major focus of her academic, pastoral and personal life and most of her work is very inter-disciplinary. She lives in Lee, NH with her partner and two children, enjoys reading, biking, nearly anything out of doors, people with a good sense of humor, music, and meditation. Her dislikes include complainers, computer failures, and pineapple.
Dialogue Essay: Well-Being: The Heart of being Human, the Art of Being Whole