The 2018 HHS Distinguished Alumni Award recipient is Dr. Kathy Etz. Dr. Etz completed her Master of Science in 1995 and her PhD in 1997 in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies, and following a one-year postdoctoral fellowship, joined the National Institute on Drug Abuse, where she has gone on to have a highly impressive career.
Her primary work is with the Native American Program, of which she has been the Director since 2016, while also serving as a Program Director for Epidemiological Research.
She also served as the Senior Advisor for Tribal Affairs at the National Institutes of Health, working with senior NIH leadership to advise on American Indian and Alaska Native issues. In this role she established tribal consultation activities at the NIH, ensuring that tribal leaders have the opportunity to provide input on NIH policies and programs.
Dr. Etz has organized many symposia, meetings, and roundtable discussions on ways of preventing health disparities and reducing drug and alcohol use among American Indian/Alaska Native populations.
One of her most effective strategies has been to find ways in which to integrate indigenous knowledge and experience with more customary scientific approaches to reduce the barriers that have long existed between the more traditional epistemological frameworks used by American Indians and those used by non-Indian scholars.
She has considerably raised the profile of research with these communities.