Patrick fills more Cabinet positions

Howard Manly

Gov.-elect Deval Patrick made more Cabinet appointments last week as he fills out his staff before taking office on Jan. 4, naming Dr. JudyAnn Bigby as Secretary of Health and Human Services and Dana Mohler-Faria, president of Bridgewater State College, as Special Adviser to the Governor for Education.

In addition, Patrick has selected former state Rep. Suzanne Bump as Secretary of Labor and Workforce Development and Kevin Burke, a former district attorney, as Secretary of Public Safety.

The medical director of Community Health Programs at Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Bigby is also an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and director of the Harvard Medical School Center of Excellence in Women’s Health, where she focuses on the health care of low-income and minority women, including breast and cervical cancer and infant mortality.

Bigby, 55, has spent her career addressing health care disparities and the needs of disadvantaged and vulnerable populations. She has published a number of studies, participated in health conferences and forums across the country and edited a book about how health issues present themselves in different racial-ethnic-cultural populations.

Bigby serves on the boards of many organizations, including Teen Voices, the Medical Foundation and the city’s Public Health Commission, a position she has held since 1996. She was a member of the Institute of Medicine’s Assuring the Health of the Public in the 21st Century Committee, and the Minority Women’s Health Panel of Experts for the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office on Women’s Health. From 1994-1999, Bigby served on the Council of Graduate Medical Education.

“In this state, where the word reform is on everyone’s lips, there are great opportunities for implementing innovations that will improve the health and wellbeing of all residents of the Commonwealth,” Bigby said. “I look forward to serving the Governor because he understands the relationships between health and social conditions and the environment.”

A Jamaica Plain resident, Bigby holds a B.A. from Wellesley College and an M.D. from Harvard Medical School.

“We are entering a very exciting and important time in Massachusetts in health and human services,” Patrick said. ”We are preparing to implement a groundbreaking health insurance reform law that will affect every single citizen in the Commonwealth, and to rejuvenate our human services delivery systems.

As Special Advisor to the Governor for Education, Mohler-Faria will be responsible for helping Patrick reorganize the state’s public education bureaucracy in an attempt to push accountability to teachers and administrators in public schools, colleges and universities.

Mohler-Faria, 59, is the first person of color to lead Bridgewater State College, and is only the second Cape Verdean in the United States to be elected the president of a higher education institution. As president, he founded the Connect Partnership, a cooperative venture between five public higher education institutions in southeastern Massachusetts. He also held the first-ever Regional Leaders Summit to align higher education offerings with regional needs.

Mohler-Faria has also chaired the State College Council of Presidents and published “Massachusetts State Colleges: The Competitive Edge,” an assessment of the importance of a long-term commitment to public higher education to the state’s future competitiveness in industry, research and employment. His key accomplishments as president include the establishment of a “rainy day” fund to stabilize changes in student charges, enabling Bridgewater State to remain one of the region’s most affordable public institutions in New England, and undertaking a sweeping review and reorganization of campus diversity planning and outreach initiatives.

“I’ve always believed that Massachusetts has the potential to be a national model for pre-school through college education,” Mohler-Faria said. ”It’s truly an honor to work with a governor who, working with the Legislature, has a commitment to bring this Commonwealth to its full potential in education. I will work with the broader educational community and leaders in the Commonwealth to bring the best advice and counsel to the Governor and the administration.”

From 1966 to 1970, he served in the U.S. Air Force, assigned to the Strategic Air Command. He achieved the rank of sergeant before receiving an honorable discharge.

Mohler-Faria is currently the chairman of the Mass Insight Higher Education Task Force on K-12 Teaching of Math and Science, and is commissioner of the Massachusetts Hall of Black Achievement. He also serves on several boards, including the Brockton Workforce Investment Board, the Massachusetts Campus Compact, the Mass Insight Education’s Great Schools Committee, Massachusetts Colleges On-Line, Massachusetts State Colleges Council of Presidents, the Metro South Chamber of Commerce and the Old Colony YMCA.

The first member of his family to go to college, Mohler-Faria holds several degrees, including an Ed.D. from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, a master’s degree in U.S. History and Afro-American Studies from Boston University and an associate’s degree in liberal arts from Cape Cod Community College.

Mohler-Faria lives in Bridgewater with his wife Kathy and 15-year-old son Jonathan.