Deborah M. Spitalnik, PhD, founding Executive Director of The Boggs Center on Disability and Human Development, New Jersey’s University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities Education, Research, and Service, Director of NJLEND, New Jersey’s Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities Program, and Professor of Pediatrics and Family Medicine and Community Health at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School is retiring after 41 years of service.
Deborah M. Spitalnik, PhD, founding Executive Director of The Boggs Center on Disability and Human Development, New Jersey’s University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities Education, Research, and Service, Director of NJLEND, New Jersey’s Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities Program, and Professor of Pediatrics and Family Medicine and Community Health at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School is retiring after 41 years of service.
A former MCH trainee, with degrees from Brandeis, Harvard, and Temple University and early work in deinstitutionalization, Dr. Spitalnik’s career has focused on developing inclusive communities by addressing the intersection between people and public policy. She has promoted the health and well-being of people with disabilities through her research and teaching, educated innumerable medical students as Course Director for the Center’s flagship Seminar on Family-Centered Care and Developmental Disabilities, developed model integrated primary care for adults and training for family medicine residents, and provided extensive consultation and information to people with disabilities, families, policymakers, state agencies, and service providers.
Among her many accomplishments, Dr. Spitalnik co-authored two editions of the diagnostic manual in Intellectual Disability and served as a member and chair of the President’s Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities, past president of the Association of University Centers on Disability (AUCD), chair of the Council on Quality and Leadership (CQL), and chair of New Jersey’s Medical Assistance Advisory Council. Her contributions have been recognized with the AUCD Lifetime Achievement and George S. Jesien Distinguished Achievement Awards, the Rutgers Clement A. Price Human Dignity Award, the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (AAIDD) Dybwad Humanitarian Award, the New Jersey Council on Developmental Disabilities Lifetime Achievement Advocacy Award, the Verice M. Mason Community Service Leader Award of the Edward J. Ill Excellence in Medicine Awards, the Humanitarian Award of The Arc of Union County, the Elizabeth Boggs Citizenship Award, and the Community Health Law Project’s Ann Klein Distinguished Advocate in Developmental Disabilities Award.
The Boggs Center honored Dr. Spitalnik with a retirement reception held on Wednesday, September 4, 2024, at the Palace at Somerset Park. During the event, attended by colleagues and friends from New Jersey and across the country, Dr. Spitalnik was presented with a joint resolution on behalf of all members of the state legislature by Senator Andrew Zwicker, and with a proclamation from New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy delivered by Sarah Adelman, Commissioner of New Jersey’s Department of Human Services.
Additional remarks were shared by: Mollie Greene, Assistant Commissioner for the New Jersey Children’s System of Care; Mercedes Witowsky and Gwen Orlowski, Executive Directors of The Boggs Center’s Developmental Disabilities Act Network partners, the New Jersey Council on Developmental Disabilities and Disability Rights New Jersey, respectively; longtime colleagues and friends Dr. Sheryl White-Scott, Cathy Ficker Terrill, and Sue Swenson; Colleen McLaughlin, The Boggs Center’s Associate Director and Carrie Coffield, Director of Pre-Service Training at The Boggs Center and Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medication School; daughter, Molly Weingart, and husband John Weingart.
The Boggs Center extends our deepest gratitude for the indelible impact Dr. Spitalnik has made in the lives of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities both in New Jersey and throughout the nation, as well as her unwavering commitment to advancing policy and practice, and her steadfast leadership over the course of her 41 years of service. May Dr. Spitalnik’s legacy of love and leadership continue in all of us as she enjoys this next chapter in life.
