John Hancock bids farewell to campus after 15 years

In his absence, Stephanie Hawk and Michelle Callahan step up with new ideas about student wellness

On July 29, Associate Dean of Students for Health and Wellness and Chief Psychologist John Hancock resigned from Lewis & Clark. 

Hancock accepted a position as the inaugural Assistant Vice President for Wellness and Support at the University of Northern Colorado (UNC). According to the LC website, Hancock said that he felt it was the right time for a change, and he is looking forward to being closer to his family again.

“It is bittersweet to announce that Dr. John Hancock, former Associate Dean for Health and Wellness, has left LC after 15 years of service to the college,” Robin Holmes-Sullivan said via email. “Although John made many contributions to the college, he was most recently known as one of the key campus leaders responsible for overseeing our successful response to the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Hancock was one of the first faculty at LC to receive the Mark Duntley Award, This award is given for excellent administrative and professional performance that enhances the functioning of the department and creates a lasting, positive impact in the Division of Student Life. Director of Health Promotion and Wellness Michelle Callahan recalls her positive working experience with John Hancock. 

“I only got to work with John for a very short time but within the Health Promotion and Wellness Office, I think John was a true leader and champion of our COVID response,” Callahan said. 

Along with having a large impact on the COVID response, Hancock also co-founded the Oregon College and University Suicide Prevention Project, a consortium of colleges working to implement best practice in student suicide prevention. Something that the Graduate Assistant for the Office of Health Promotion and Wellness Stephine Hawk is really interested in promoting 

“During my interview with him, we talked a lot about before COVID, a lot of his work was around suicide prevention,” Stephanie Hawk said. “Which, to me, was very interesting because that’s where I’m coming from.”

Hawk’s role has been to hold confidential advocate space for any survivors that want or need support, but she also works with students who are struggling with alcohol or drug use. Hawk hopes to normalize conversations around suicide prevention and to provide support to resident advisors and other student advocates. 

As the associate dean of students for health and wellness, Hancock was the head of all health promotion and wellness, overseeing Health Services, Counseling Services and the Office of Health Promotion and Wellness. Now Callahan, Interim Director of Counseling Services Robin Kyler and the Interim Directors of Health Services Julie Radostitz and Jess Kingsbury  are having to operate without an associate dean of students for Health and Wellness. 

“It is an interesting time in wellness services to not have an associate dean, we are still operating as if we have an associate dean and ensuring we’re all talking and working collaboratively because we all understand at the end of the day, we’re trying to approach student health from a holistic lens,” Callahan said.  

Callahan wants to encourage students to come and talk to her about the problems that they are seeing on campus. She quoted disability activists, saying “nothing about us without us.” She wants to promote the proactive response to students’ needs on campus. 

This upcoming semester, Hawk and the Feminist Student Union are working to spread awareness and knowledge on how to be a supportive advocate for a student who has experienced sexual assault through the Sexual Assault Peer Advocacy training. Hawk is also working on Lead the Change: Bystander Intervention training. 

“It’s being led by students who were trained specifically to facilitate it,” Hawk said. “Which I think is really cool because that information coming from peers I feel like is more digestible. Also the power differential, different relationship and energy in the room, I think can be very different.” 

Students can get into contact with Health Promotion and Wellness either by calling 503-768-8225 or by emailing healthed@lclark.edu. The Health Promotion and Wellness office is currently located in Lower Odell Hall.