Stephen F. Gambescia is professor of health services administration and director of the Doctor of Health Science program in the College of Nursing and Health Professions at Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA. He has held the range of academic administrative positions at three universities. These included Dean of Graduate and Professional Studies (Cabrini College, Radnor, PA); Assistant Dean (Goodwin College/Drexel); Assistant Dean of Academic and Student Affairs (College of Nursing and Health Professions/Drexel); Assistant Program Director, ( CNHP/Drexel); Assistant to the President for Strategic Initiatives, Assistant to the Vice President for Academic Affairs, Executive Director of Liberal Studies Division, and Executive Director of Continuing Professional Education (Neumann College, Aston, PA); and Executive Director of an eight college consortium in Southeastern PA.
Prior to working in higher education, Dr. Gambescia held a number of educational leadership roles, eventually serving as a vice president in a metro and multi-state division for two of the largest national voluntary health agencies (American Cancer Society and American Heart Association). He has 40 years of experience in the field of health promotion/disease prevention and public health policy review. His research interests have been in tobacco control, chronic disease risk awareness/prevention, and broadly in health communications. His research interests in higher education include continuing professional education program development, evaluation, credentialing, and online learning. He is co-author of a book on Managing a Public Speaker Bureau for Health and Human Services Organizations, Kluwer Publications, and is one of three editors for a book on Managing Nonprofit Health Organizations, Health Administration Press. He has written a book giving testimony to parents who raised big families, and prepared a posthumous publication for his father on Reflections on a Pilgrimage to Rome on the Occasion of the Canonization of St. John Neumann. He is the founding editor of the journal Pedagogy in Health Promotion.
Dr. Gambescia is active in the state and national public health professional associations. He has held several leadership positions, including president, of the Society for Public Health Education where is noted as a Distinguished Fellow in 2016. He has been a member of a Board and a Commissioner for the National Commission on Health Education Credentialing (chair 2013). . He has served on a number of community, civic, educational, and religious boards and committees ranging from the Board of Directors for a high school, trustee for Delaware County Community College, to the 10th Synod of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.
Dr. Gambescia has been invited as a guest lecturer at a dozen universities and colleges in the region on topics such as: Case Studies in Health Promotion Planning; Tobacco Marketing: A Case Study in Business Ethics; Health, Politics, and Policy; Voluntary Health Agencies` Role in Health Policy Development; Patient Education, and Social Marketing. Frequently published commentaries in metropolitan daily newspapers and syndication have played an adjunct role in his broad academic and sociopolitical interests.
Personal Information:
Born: 7 December 1957 - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Son of the late Joseph M. Gambescia, M.D. and Mary E. (nee Botto) twelfth child of sixteen
Married: Susan (Rice); children: Stephanie Marie, 39; Stephen Joseph, 31; grandson Kellen 12 and Timothy James (TJ) 8 months.
Avocational activities: avid distance runner and open water distance swimmer; avid reader of political science, philosophy, education & social policy, leadership, and media studies.