Observer Staff Report
UC Davis’ Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing recently honored two community advocates— OBSERVER Senior Staff Writer Genoa Barrow and Underground Books operator Georgia West—with Equity-Minded Community Awards for uplifting its cause.
“We wanted to lift up the idea that we at the University of California Davis Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing and the university could not accomplish what we set out to do to improve the region’s well-being without the community,” said Professor Emeritus Dr. Jann Murray-Garcia, who presented the awards at the Guild Theater last week.
Barrow, who recently celebrated her 25th anniversary with The OBSERVER was honored for outstanding health equity reporting.
“The Sacramento Observer is part of the indispensable contribution and tradition of
Black newspapers that go all the way back to Frederick Douglass’ North Star and
Ida B. Wells’ numerous anti-lynching articles published in Black newspapers
across the country at the turn of the 20th century,” Dr. Murray-Garcia said.
“Ms.Genoa Barrow helps us operationalize the notion that UC Davis is the people’s university, working on its behalf,” Dr. Murray-Garcia said. “It would be an insurmountable challenge to get the news out in particular to Sacramento’s Black community about how UC Davis is serving the community. Beyond what UC Davis tries to do in educating the community about health issues, our hopes for community education regarding health issues are realized in Ms. Barrow’s work.”
Dr. Murray-Garcia highlighted some of Barrow’s other recent accolades, including winning a second-place award in Health Reporting from the California Newspaper Publishers Association for her special series, “Painfully Aware: Examining the Impact of Sickle Cell
Disease in the African American Community” and a first place win from the National Newspaper Publisher’s Association for her series, “Culture of Care “ which she wrote on local Black nurses. This series featured the School of Nursing’s own alumni
Carter Todd and Aron King, and also featured director Dr. Kupiri Ackerman-
Barger in an article titled, “Nursing Leader Works Toward Equity.”
“More recently, she highlighted the personal uplifting instructive mental
health journey of King in May of this year, in an article titled, ‘A
Change Of Heart: Group Sessions Help Local Nurse Aron King Rethink
Therapy.’ Her work on Black men’s mental health, I am certain will be impacting the Black community for decades to come.”
While unable to attend the award presentation, West, widely known as “Mother Rose,” received an Equity-Minded Community award for “lifetime achievement, service and love to the Sacramento Community.”
“Many of us know her as the owner of Underground Books next door, which opened to serve the community in 2003, but many of us are unaware that Mother Rose worked as a registered nurse for over 27 years,” Dr. Murray-Garcia said.
“In 1973, she graduated from the top-ranked nursing program in the state, located at Sacramento City College. She worked all over in med-surg, step-down units, outpatient treatment centers and loved every bit of it.”
Dr. Murray-Garcia met Mother Rose in 2005 when she started a UC Davis fellowship.
“She was always so excited to see me and so proud that I was part of UC Davis. Her store was the last stop on the Oak Park Neighborhood Walking Tour I had the privilege to do with Mr. David Williams. When we took the CEO of the Health System, the then new Deans of the Schools of Nursing and Medicine, and the Chief Diversity Officer on a historical tour of Sacramento, Underground Books was our first stop. Mother Rose’s nursing career did not end with clinical nursing. Her contributions continue to bring health to the community and we celebrate her lifetime of achievement.”