Vivien Thomas Scholars Initiative at Johns Hopkins University
The Vivien Thomas Scholars Initiative, a $150 million investment, was launched at the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) to address historic underrepresentation in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields, and prepare a new, more diverse generation of researchers and scholars to assume leadership roles in tackling some of the world’s greatest challenges. Named for Vivien Thomas, a renowned Black scientist who helped develop the Blalock-Taussig shunt — a cardiac surgery technique to treat blue baby syndrome — at The Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1940s, Bloomberg Philanthropies is endowing this effort to create additional pathways for students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) to pursue and receive PhDs in STEM fields. This gift provides permanent funding for a sustained cohort of diverse PhD students in JHU’s more than 30 STEM programs.
We cannot hope to produce the best science nor ensure that our faculties are truly representative until there is an increase in the diversity of our students in PhD programs. Through the Vivien Thomas Scholars Initiative, Johns Hopkins now has the opportunity and imperative to invest ambitiously, think ambitiously, and act ambitiously to begin correcting the longstanding inequity in PhD education.
Ronald J. Daniels, President of Johns Hopkins University
The PhD students that are a part of this program are known as the Vivien Thomas Scholars, in recognition of one of Johns Hopkins’ most celebrated figures. Dr. Thomas is a renowned Black scientist who is best known for his work to develop a cardiac surgery technique to treat “blue baby syndrome” (Blalock-Taussig shunt) at The Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1940s — a life-saving advance for which he did not receive credit for decades.
There remains a tremendous need to diversify STEM PhD programs; in 2019, there were more than 30 fields of science — including multiple disciplines in biology, chemistry, physics, math, and engineering — in which fewer than five PhDs were awarded to Black or Latinx students in the United States. And while Black Americans comprise 13 percent of the U.S. population, in 2019 they received just three percent of new engineering, math, physical sciences, and computer science PhDs. Through the Vivien Thomas Scholars Initiative, Johns Hopkins will dramatically scale up its efforts to diversify its STEM PhD programs and graduate more diverse PhD recipients to help bring much needed new perspectives and backgrounds to STEM industries and workforces.