Barnes Earns GSA’s 2024 James Jackson Outstanding Mentorship Award
The Gerontological Society of America (GSA) — the nation’s largest interdisciplinary organization devoted to the field of aging — has chosen Lisa L. Barnes, PhD, FGSA, of Rush University Medical Center as the 2024 recipient of the James Jackson Outstanding Mentorship Award.
This distinguished honor is given annually and recognizes individuals who have exemplified outstanding commitment and dedication to mentoring minority researchers in the field of aging. It was renamed in 2021 in memory of James Jackson, PhD, FGSA, a pioneering psychologist in the fields of race and culture and the impact of racial disparities on minority health, and himself a previous recipient of the award.
The award presentation will take place at GSA’s 2024 Annual Scientific Meeting, which will be held from November 13 to 16 in Seattle, Washington. This conference is organized to foster interdisciplinary collaboration among researchers, educators, and practitioners who specialize in the study of the aging process.
Barnes is the Alla V. and Solomon Jesmer Professor of Gerontology and Geriatric Medicine and a cognitive neuropsychologist within the Rush Alzheimer’s Disease Center at Rush University Medical Center. She is also the associate director of the Rush Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center.
She has received many National Institutes of Health grants and has published over 300 manuscripts. She is internationally recognized for her contributions to minority aging and minority health. Her research interests include disparities in chronic diseases of aging, cognitive decline, and risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease.
Barnes has consistently used her leadership positions to help support and promote students and junior investigators. Taken together, the experience of directing her own studies, her previous role as a director of a Center of Excellence that focused on building a pipeline of new investigators with health disparities expertise, and her current role as a principal investigator of Rush’s Clinical and Translational Science Awards KL2 training program, have provided her with significant mentoring expertise.
She has also provided formal mentorship for seven PhD dissertation committees, six post-doctoral fellows, and nine individuals on career development grants, and served as faculty for the Alzheimer’s Association Summer Research Institute and Butler Williams Scholars Program, as well as on the steering committee of the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students. Beyond these quantifiable mentorship metrics, Barnes spends countless hours serving as an informal mentor — both for students and investigators at Rush and beyond.
In 2023, she became part of the leadership team of the National Coordinating Center for the Resource Centers for Minority Aging Research, which is funded by the National Institute on Aging and run by GSA. She also is the principal investigator of two longitudinal community-based studies of older African Americans, including the Minority Aging Research Study, which has been funded by the National Institute on Aging since 2004, and the African American Clinical Core, which she has led since 2008. She advocates for recruitment of under-represented groups into clinical studies and has received many awards and fellowships from universities and organizations throughout the U.S. She is a GSA fellow, which represents the highest category of membership within the Society.
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The Gerontological Society of America (GSA) is the nation’s oldest and largest interdisciplinary organization devoted to research, education, and practice in the field of aging. The principal mission of the Society — and its 5,500+ members — is to advance the study of aging and disseminate information among scientists, decision makers, and the general public. GSA’s structure includes a nonpartisan public policy institute, the National Academy on an Aging Society, and GSA is also home to the National Center to Reframe Aging and the National Coordinating Center for the Resource Centers for Minority Aging Research.