Updated: July 22, 2022 at 2:29 p.m.
GW will join other D.C. schools in a national initiative dedicated to fighting gun violence, according to a University release Wednesday.
The Consortium of Universities of the Washington Metropolitan Area, which is comprised of 20 colleges and universities in the D.C. area and is spearing the effort, said they created the 120 Initiative last week in response to recent mass shootings in Buffalo, N.Y., Highland Park, Ill and Uvalde, Texas. The release states that the initiative will try to pressure officials to develop an “action plan” for addressing gun violence in the United States.
Interim University President Mark Wrighton, who will personally join the initiative along with his wife Risa Zwerling Wrighton, said in the release that GW has the capacity to come together and provide research on how best to address the gun violence epidemic.
“The George Washington University and our Consortium partners across the region have a unique ability to convene and bring to bear the research and expertise to address the most pressing challenges of our times,” Wrighton said in the release. “Our university must help contribute solutions to overcome this major public health crisis.”
Adnan Hyder, a professor of global health at the Milken Institute School of Public Health and the director of the Center on Commercial Determinants of Health at Milken, said in the release he joined the initiative to create “global dialogue” on the issue of American gun violence.
“When the federal government appears not to work, then you try to do what you can at the local level,” Hyder said in the release.
Other Milken faculty to join the initiative include Amita Vyas, an associate professor and director of the Maternal and Child Health Program, Naomi Seller, an associate professor of health policy and management, Mark Edberg, a professor of prevention and community health, Jack Sandberg, an associate professor of global health, Katie Horton, a research professor of health policy and management and Nino Paichadze, an assistant research professor of global health.
This post was updated to correct the following:
The Hatchet incorrectly spelled Risa Zwerling Wrighton’s name. We regret this error.
