Emily Gurley to Receive Alumni Award from Oglethorpe University

Related Media

Emily Gurley

ATLANTA, GA (04/13/2010)(readMedia)-- Oglethorpe University will present alumna Emily Gurley '96 with the Spirit of Oglethorpe Award during the 175th Anniversary Gala and Awards Banquet on Friday, April 17, 2010 at 7:00 p.m. at The Retreat of Dunwoody at Perimeter Summit in Atlanta, Georgia.

The Spirit of Oglethorpe Award is presented to an Oglethorpe University alum who lives by the Oglethorpe motto ("Make a life. Make a living. Make a difference."), demonstrating the attributes of a liberal arts education by exhibiting creativity, purposefulness, and a commitment to improving the quality of their community.

At age 11, Emily Gurley relocated with her family from Ball Ground, Georgia to Dhaka, Bangladesh, setting the stage for her life's work. After graduating from Oglethorpe University with a degree in history, Gurley became a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer in Romania where she designed HIV education campaigns for high schools and worked with the country's first hospice.

Gurley returned to the U.S. and completed a Master's degree in Public Health at Emory University in 2002. For the next six years, she worked with the Program on Infectious Diseases and Vaccine Sciences at the International Diarrheal Diseases Research Centre, Bangladesh where she designed or implemented more than 30 research studies and led surveillance activities for respiratory disease and meningo-encephalitis. She also led investigations of outbreaks and subsequent prevention strategies. Her outbreak investigations have included person-to-person transmission of Nipah, a newly emerging virus; toxic poisoning from eating wild plants during food shortages; and pesticides as the cause of sudden child death.

Gurley's current research interests include preventing transmission of respiratory disease in resource-poor hospitals; incorporating post-mortem exams into outbreak response; and quantifying the burden of maternal and neonatal deaths associated with hepatitis E in Bangladesh. She has authored or co-authored more than 20 scientific publications. Gurley recently relocated to Baltimore to begin her Doctor of Philosophy degree in infectious disease epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Oglethorpe University

Celebrating the 175th anniversary of its founding in 1835, Oglethorpe University enrolls over 1,000 students representing 34 states and 36 countries. The Princeton Review's The Best 361 Colleges 2010 edition ranks Oglethorpe in its prestigious list, and puts Oglethorpe at #20 for its Professors, #17 for Theatre and #10 for class/race interaction and also names it a Best Southeastern College. Oglethorpe University is Georgia's only coeducational member of the Annapolis Group, an organization of America's most selective liberal arts institutions. Since 2006, Oglethorpe has been named annually to the President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll for commitment to and achievement in community service. The university plays in the NCAA Division III Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference. Georgia Shakespeare is the professional theater-in-residence at Oglethorpe. Website: www.oglethorpe.edu