A Message from the Founding Executive Director of The Boggs Center

Tuesday, July 2, 2024

To The Boggs Center Community:

As we enter the season full bore and mark the beginning of our new academic year, I am writing with updates from The Boggs Center.

This Summer I am retiring from The Boggs Center. What a great privilege I had to plan the Center with colleagues across the state and then being invited to come to the medical school 41 years ago as founding Executive Director. From our original designation as New Jersey’s University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities, we have also become New Jersey’s Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities - NJLEND program as we continue to partner with our colleagues in state government and collaborate with all of you. We have grown to almost fifty strong, including faculty and staff. It is the strength of our long standing partnerships with all of you, the skills and dedication of everyone at The Boggs Center, and on-going capacity building with and on behalf of people with disabilities, which gives me the confidence to make my own transition, knowing the Center will continue to be a thriving, growing contributor.

A reflection of the continuing growth and role of The Boggs Center within Rutgers and the community is a name change we have pursued for over a  year. We are becoming The Boggs Center on Disability and Human Development, reflecting the Center’s role within the Department of Pediatrics, Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, and Rutgers University, as the nexus between disability and human development. As the work in developmental disabilities within the New Jersey community continues to expand, this more embracing name reflects our continued additional growth and contributions to health and well-being through student and professional education and contributing to the knowledge base through research, guided by the lived experience of people and families.

I am so excited to tell you that the work of The Boggs Center will be enhanced by our having created the physical learning and training capacity within our office space that will enhance the educational experience in person and virtually, reflecting our continuing growth and connectedness. Our new educational technology will create a more accessible and comfortable environment for learners. We look forward to welcoming you both virtually and in person to this enhanced environment.

The strength, expertise, and continuing contributions of everyone at The Boggs Center and a productive search for a new Director of The Boggs Center who will serve as a Division Director in the Department of Pediatrics as I have done, fills me with great confidence that The Boggs Center will grow and thrive in partnership with all of you.

As I move towards tending my garden, literally and metaphorically, I have such overwhelming gratitude for the children and adults with disabilities and families who have let me walk alongside them in their joys and accomplishments as well as struggles, for the generations of students and fellows I and The Boggs Center have touched, the continuing and positive collaborations with our state partners and the community, and my Boggs Center colleagues.

With love, gratitude, and great confidence that The Boggs Center will continue to grow and thrive as a trusted resource and contributor.

Deborah M. Spitalnik, PhD
Professor of Pediatrics and Family Medicine and Community Health
Executive Director, The Boggs Center and NJLEND