SUNDAY 7TH DECEMBER, 2014 – UWI TODAY
5
OUR CAMPUS COMMUNITY
The UWI is pleased to welcome
Professor Julie
Meeks Gardner as the new Deputy Principal
of its Open Campus. Professor Meeks Gardner
joins Pro Vice-Chancellor Professor V. Eudine
Barriteau who was installed as the Open Campus
Principal in August this year. Together, the two
will oversee the University’s more than 46 Open
Campus sites.
Julie Meeks Gardner, Professor of Child
Development and Nutrition, has been on staff
at The University of the West Indies for over
20 years. During that time, she trained at the
Tropical Metabolism Research Unit at the Mona
campus carrying out PhDwork on the behavioural
development of undernourished children. Her
post-doctoral work at Cambridge University
focused on cross-cultural assessments of child
cognition at the MRC Applied Psychology Unit.
Professor Meeks Gardner has also spent
her career equally dedicated to issues of child
development. Among her pioneering work is
research on children and violence, including the
development of aggression and violence among
children, interventions that reduce violence
and aggression, children’s involvement in gangs
and the effects of violence on children in the
Caribbean. In 2004, she was appointedHead of the
Caribbean Child Development Centre (CCDC),
then a part of The UWI’s School of Continuing
Studies. When The University’s Open Campus
was established in 2008, the Centre became a
part of the Consortium for Social Development
and Research (CSDR), and Meeks Gardner was
appointed its first Director.
In another first, Professor Meeks Gardner
became the first Campus Coordinator for
Graduate Studies and Research of the Open
Campus in 2012. She has led many research
projects supported by international organisations,
agencies, grant funders, and has been published
widely in numerous international research
journals.
Professor Meeks Gardner has authored and
edited several books, book chapters, technical
reports, and monographs. She currently serves
The UWI in a number of capacities, including
the Senate, the Open Campus Council and the
Appointments Committee. She also represents
The UWI at the regional level on the CARICOM
Working Groups for Early Childhood and for
Health and Family Life Education, and serves
on many boards, agencies and committees in
Jamaica.
Under her direction, the CCDC received the
Principal’s Award for Best PerformingDepartment
in the Open Campus, 2012, and Meeks Gardner
was the recipient of the Vice-Chancellor’s Award
for Excellence in Research and Public Service,
2011.
Professor Meeks Gardner’s appointment took
effect on October 1, 2014, succeeding Professor
Vivienne Roberts, who has retired.
ProfessorMeeks Gardner
is Deputy Principal at Open Campus
