Sarah Berga
Sarah Berga, MD
SRI President, 2012-2013
I remember my year as President of the SGI as one of challenge and reward. There were many issues that required immediate attention. Our organization was experiencing a fiscal challenge that required we seek a new business model. The funding dearth for scientists was worsening. At the last minute, we were asked by NIH leadership to cancel our first-of-its-kind SGI-NICHD satellite meeting on implantation failure and recurrent pregnancy loss because of a federal budget stalemate that led to a travel restriction that effectively prevented intramural NIH participants from attending the meeting. Nothing focuses the mind like adversity.
Our theme Plasticity: Molecules to Motherhood and Beyond suddenly took on new significance. We had selected this focus to recognize the progress that we had made as an interdisciplinary field in illuminating the mechanisms by which our reproductive system adapts to our ever-changing milieu. Our meeting was held in Orlando, Florida. The earnestness of our Society’s endeavors contrasted vividly with the cartoon ambience of Mickey Mouse ears in the lobby. It was difficult to avoid moments of feeling surreal.
Yolanda Smith, MD and the Scientific Program Committee chaired by Kelle Moley, MD, created an outstanding program. One of our innovations was to institute a robust mechanism for solicitation of symposia. Another was to incorporate the emergent field of sex differences. In the first plenary lecture, Margaret McCarthy, PhD, of the University of Maryland, highlighted the incredibly intricate interactions among sex steroids and multiple neural pathways involved in sexual differentiation of the brain, effectively arguing against a simplistic binary notion of male and female brains and heralding the expansion of gender conceptualization that has led to the recognition of what is now termed LGBTQAI. Our revised understanding that sex and gender are not dichotomous coupled with our panoply of assisted reproductive technologies has given new meaning to concepts of parenthood, family, and diversity.
One explicit goal for our program was to embrace new scientific arenas relevant to reproduction and another was to attract a more diverse membership by focusing on career development. It seemed highly pertinent that we had chosen as a theme how politics shaped opportunity for reproductive science and science in general. The Past President’s Leadership Initiative focused on overcoming career barriers. The Minority Investigator Forum illuminated issues relevant to career development for minority investigators. The Women in Reproductive Sciences (WIRES) sponsored Linda Carli, PhD, of Wellesley College, who tackled gender differences in career development as outlined in her book Through the Labyrinth: The Truth about How Women Become Leaders.
We continued to emphasize the importance of young investigators to the future of SGI. A particular success was the evening event for new investigators called Connection Corners which was so popular that the crowd overflowed into the hall. The capstone of our career development theme was the secondary plenary speaker, Paula Stephan, PhD, Professor of Economics and Policy Studies at Georgia State University, whose presentation highlighting insights from her recently published book How Economics Shapes Science proved to be both illuminating and controversial. She noted that while the beauty of science may be pure and eternal, the practice of science costs money. Our intent in inviting Dr. Stephan was to help us understand that scientific inquiry must appeal to its funders, namely society at large.
Inevitably, one’s Presidency is defined by the awards the President has the privilege to confer. The 2013 recipient of the SGI-Pardi Distinguished Scientist Award was Charles Lockwood MD, MHCM, then Dean of the College of Medicine at Ohio State University. The 2013 recipient of the President’s Achievement Award was Carolyn Gargett, PhD, of Monash Institute of Medical Research in Australia. Joan Hunt, PhD, of the University of Kansas received the Fred Naftolin Award for Mentorship.
A signature administrative accomplishment was launching the initiative to establish our own grants. Council during my Presidency was highly engaged and included Hilary Critchley, MD, James Segars, MD, Jane Norman, MD, Roger Smith, MB, BS, PhD, Marilyn Cipolla, PhD, and Hugh Taylor MD. Our then Secretary-Treasurer, Kirk Conrad, MD, was especially instrumental in ensuring that we became an granting agency as well as an annual forum for reproductive investigation.
As always, one stands on the shoulders of Past Presidents. My immediate predecessors were Felice Petraglia, MD, Les Myatt, PhD, Robert Taylor, MD, PhD, and Stephen Lye, PhD. Fortunately, the Presidents who followed incorporated past themes, directions, and initiatives. Like the Olympic torch, our mission has been passed from one runner to the next since 1953 and the President bears the responsibility to see that the flame remains fueled and burns bright. The runners who subsequently took up the cause and shaped its evolution to SRI are Kelle Moley, MD, Serdar Bulun, MD, Hugh Taylor, MD, Yoel Sadovsky, MD, and Sandy Davidge, PhD. Without their commitment to our forum, our flame could have easily have been extinguished.
It is wonderfully indulgence to relish the past. Much was accomplished during my Presidency and yet much remained to be done. Our success depends on looking to the future, fostering opportunity, and embracing new directions. The vision of SGI / SRI is a flame that must be continually renewed and made relevant by successive generations of investigators. My hope is that we continue our evolution and remain forever relevant.