MTSU College of Behavioral and Health Sciences gets green light for $43,000 grant

Mar 30, 2015 at 07:11 pm by bryan


The MTSU College of Behavioral and Health Sciences (CBHS) received a grant from The Baptist Healing Trust, which awarded funds totaling over $1.07 Million in its most recent grant cycle. "We are proud to help support 27 local non-profits working to create access to quality, compassionate health services for the community's most vulnerable residents," said President & CEO Dr. Cathy Self. The mission of the Baptist Healing Trust, a private grant making foundation, is the sacred work of fostering healing and wholeness for vulnerable populations through strategic investing, philanthropy, and advocacy.

The CBHS grant award for $43,000 will be used to support the efforts of the Healthy Raiders Reading Program. The program is a service learning partnership focused on providing members of underserved populations in Rutherford County with knowledge of how to become active participants in the healthcare process while training undergraduate psychology, allied health, and pre-medical students to become compassionate caregivers. The project, under the direction of noted health literacy researchers Drs. Stuart Bernstein and Catherine Crooks, partners with Read to Succeed, St. Thomas Mobile Medical Unit, Head Start, and Murfreesboro City and Rutherford County Schools as part of newly formed CBHS and Murfreesboro City Schools Collaborative Learning and Leadership Institute.

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"The work of Drs. Bernstein and Crooks speaks to our primary mission in the College. They are not only training the next generation of professionals to make an immediate impact upon graduation, but they are using that training in real world settings to address one of our most intractable issues, health literacy. The grant award from The Baptist Healing Trust is a tremendous affirmation of the value of their efforts," said Dean Terry Whiteside, upon learning of the award. "This is an investment that will help us to improve learning outcomes for our students and health outcomes for our neighbors."

Recipients of the contributions include non-profit organizations from 40 counties in Middle Tennessee that focus on physical health, mental health, and recovery from alcohol and drug abuse or healing from abuse, neglect, and violence. This year's grants bring the collective grant making of the Baptist Healing Trust to over $69 million since 2002. The Trust, while created out of the sale of Baptist Hospital to Ascension Health/St. Thomas Health Services, is a private, independent foundation and is not affiliated with the St. Thomas Health Services or the St. Thomas Health Services Fund.

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