We are excited to announce that the University of Pittsburgh’s schools of Medicine and Social Work have been awarded a $5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to test the effectiveness of the Racial Equity Consciousness Institute (RECI), an effort aimed at addressing systemic racism.
Ron Idoko, Associate Director of the Center on Race and Social Problems, founded the institute in 2021 and brought it to the Center for Race and Social Problems in Pitt’s School of Social Work. He developed RECI over several years conducting anti-bias trainings through his previous position as program coordinator for Pitt’s Office for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion.
The research funded by this grant will focus on identifying the effectiveness of RECI training and other implicit bias trainings on diversity and retention as well as on attitudes that perpetuate systemic racism in healthcare outcomes, particularly among marginalized communities.
The outcomes of the interventions will be measured through questionnaires and functional brain imaging, or fMRIs, to look for structural brain changes before and after the intervention.
Key collaborating partners on this team from Pitt's School of Medicine include:
- Dr. Doris Rubio, Director of Pitt's Institute for Clinical Research Education
- Dr. Gretchen White, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Epidemiology and Clinical and Translational Science in the Department of Medicine
Click here to read the full article on this exciting announcement!
Current Pitt faculty, staff and students are also invited to register for the Pitt fall 2024 RECI cohort starting October 3rd (sponsored by the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) - Click here to learn more