Renee Jenkins

Dr. Jenkins is professor and chair, Department of Pediatrics and Child Health at Howard University and adjunct professor of Pediatrics at George Washington University, both in Washington, DC. She graduated from Wayne State University School of Medicine and completed her residency at Jacobi Hospital/Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City. After completing a fellowship in Adolescent Medicine at Montefiore Hospital in New York, Dr. Jenkins started an adolescent medicine program at Howard. In 1994, Dr. Jenkins was appointed Department Chair, and during her tenure directed the departmental training program and practice plan. Dr. Jenkins has served on many AAP task forces and committees, including the Committee on Adolescence, the Task Forces on Pediatric AIDS and Reimbursement, and the Committee on Federal Government Affairs. She chaired the Committee on Community Health Services. Dr. Jenkins is a past-president of the AAP Washington, DC, Chapter. Adolescent health and underserved children have been the focus of Dr. Jenkins’ career, both nationally and in her community. Says Dr. Jenkins, “The Academy must turn up the volume and be a loud and effective voice for children’s issues and concerns.” Dr. Jenkins was president of the Society for Adolescent Medicine, and chair of the Pediatric Section of the National Medical Association. She is a member of the American Pediatric Society, Ambulatory Pediatric Association and the Institute of Medicine, having served on its Board on Children, Youth and Families. She is a contributing author of Nelson’s Textbook of Pediatrics and the Principal Investigator at Howard for the DC-Baltimore Research Center on Child Health Disparities, a collaboration with Children’s National Medical Center, Johns Hopkins Pediatrics Department Primary Care Division and the DC Health Department. In Washington, D.C., Dr. Jenkins and colleagues started the Center for Youth Services, and she chaired the Mayor’s Committee on Teen Pregnancy Prevention. Dr. Jenkins is married with one daughter, a recent graduate of the Medical College of Wisconsin.