Woutrina Smith of UC Davis has been named one of the leaders of the UC Global Health Institute’s new Center of Expertise on Planetary Health. The center has two co-directors: Smith, associate professor of infectious disease epidemiology in the School of Veterinary Medicine; and David Lopez-Carr, professor of geography and director of the Human-Environment Dynamics Lab at UC Santa Barbara.

The institute’s centers of excellence are charged with developing and leading UC-wide education programs, targeted multicampus research endeavors, and sustainable international partnerships for implementing programs and interventions to improve health globally and in California.

The Global Health Institute also announced renewed funding for another center and changed its name from the Center of Expertise on Women’s Health and Empowerment, to the Center of Expertise on Women’s Health, Gender and Empowerment. Its co-directors are UC Berkeley’s Ndola Prata, professor of population and family planning, and maternal child health, and director of the Bixby Center for Population, Health and Sustainability; and UCLA’s Dallas Swendeman, assistant professor, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, David Geffen School of Medicine, and co-director of the Global Center for Children and Families Center for HIV Identification, Prevention and Treatment Services.

Brent Wagstaff: mission continuity manager

Brent Wagstaff is the campus's new mission continuity manager. He reports to Clement Stokes, the director of Emergency Management and Mission Continuity, part of the Safety Services unit.

​Wagstaff, who started in late June, has been hired to provide leadership to help the campus prepare to maintain essential functions in an emergency or resume them in a timely way. He is focused on helping campus departments and units develop and update business continuity plans. In addition, he supports Stokes and the Emergency Operation Center, which coordinates campus response to major emergencies.

Wagstaff most recently served for two years as business continuity analyst with the financial services organization TIAA CREF in Colorado and has been an emergency planner with the state of Utah's Division of Emergency Management.

He earned a bachelor's degree in emergency management from Utah Valley University. He is certified as a business continuity professional and has completed a series of professional development courses through the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

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