UTEP School of Pharmacy Dean Receives Lifetime Achievement Award
José O. Rivera, Pharm.D., dean of UTEP’s School of Pharmacy, has received the prestigious Paul F. Parker award, which is given to alumni of the University of Kentucky Pharmacy Residency Program who have dedicated themselves to advancing the pharmacy field through their practice and work in academia. Rivera will be honored with the lifetime achievement award at the upcoming American Society of Health-System Pharmacists midyear meeting in Anaheim, California on Dec. 5, 2023.
The award is named for Parker, a pioneer in the pharmacy field who established the University of Kentucky Hospital and implemented pharmacy practice and teaching programs with the University of Kentucky College of Pharmacy. It honors individuals who have demonstrated sustained contribution, commitment, leadership and innovation to the field of pharmacy. The award also recognizes individuals who have supported the academic and professional success of others, as Parker himself accomplished in his career.
“I was not expecting it,” Rivera said of winning the award. “But at the same time, the way I was educated in terms of doing what we need to do to help patients, a lot of it has to do with Paul Parker. He developed people to go on to do things to improve patient outcomes. It’s an incredible award.”
As a student, Rivera had the opportunity to work directly with Parker, who had a huge influence on his career today.
“When I went to Kentucky, he was somebody who welcomed me,” Rivera said. “I was one of the few Latinos or Latinas that were part of [the program]. But I didn’t feel like I was. Paul Parker to me was a role model.”
Rivera is the first Latino recipient of the award and one of only two Hispanic deans at schools of pharmacy in the nation. Originally from Barranquitas, Puerto Rico – a small, mountain town of roughly 30,000 people in central Puerto Rico – Rivera made the trip to the United States to pursue his Doctor of Pharmacy at Kentucky, graduating and completing his residency in 1979. After graduating, Rivera held positions with the University of Cincinnati in Ohio, the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, and later Sierra Medical Center and Thomason General Hospital in El Paso.
His career is most punctuated by his work in helping to establish UTEP’s School of Pharmacy. Rivera came to UTEP in 1996. He served as a director in UTEP’s co-op pharmacy program with The University of Texas at Austin before stepping in to help transform UTEP’s pharmacy program into an accredited, degree-awarding program.
“In 2015, after multiple years of trying to get more funding from legislation to support and increase the co-op program, [we had] funding to establish a new School of Pharmacy,” Rivera said. “[Former UTEP President Diana] Natalicio and [former Executive Vice President] Richard Adauto contacted me in July of 2015 to tell me we were going to start a school of pharmacy.”
It was an arduous task. At the time, UTEP’s pharmacy program had only five faculty members, who Rivera lovingly called “Los Cinco Gatos” or “the Five Cats” because they often found themselves in different areas around town, supporting students, continuing to practice in the field and ensuring positive patient outcomes on all fronts. Together, they embarked on the journey of establishing the school.
“You need to have a dean for two years before you can apply for pre-candidate status” as part of the accreditation process, Rivera said. “In the past, the dean then would hire a couple of associate deans, and they would design the curriculum. Today, the faculty [who teach the courses] develop the curriculum, but the journey took all these years.”
Though following the process took longer than they hoped, they worked together to successfully establish UTEP’s School of Pharmacy, which officially opened its doors in 2018, graduating its first class in 2021 – all while navigating the changes brought on by the pandemic as a newly minted program.
As the only pharmacy school along the U.S.-Mexico border, the school places a huge emphasis on supporting student success in the field, including Hispanic students, and expanding pharmacy access to Hispanic people. The program accomplishes this as the only one in the nation to implement mandatory language immersion and study away programs in the curriculum. Rivera went from being one of only two Hispanic students in a pharmacy program to leading the School of Pharmacy at America’s leading Hispanic-serving university, utilizing many of the same principles that Parker exemplified at the University of Kentucky.
“Some people say, ‘Why did you stay in such a little co-op program here?’” Rivera said. “But I just value the impact of what we are doing. It’s very rewarding in terms of the impact that we are having with students and the community. Now, with a larger cohort of students, I’m optimistic that we will continue to evolve.”
To learn more about the Paul F. Parker award, please visit: https://pharmacy.uky.edu/alumni-friends/paul-parker-award.
Last Updated on December 01, 2023 at 12:00 AM | Originally published December 01, 2023
By Julia Hettiger UTEP Marketing and Communications
