WashU Installs Brownson in New Professorship 1/15/2015 Faculty; Public Health Share this Story: Dr. Ross C. Brownson has been installed as the Bernard Becker Professor at the Brown School, Washington University in St. Louis. A leading expert in chronic disease prevention and applied epidemiology, Dr. Brownson holds joint appointments at the Brown School and in Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. His professorship is named after the late Dr. Bernard Becker, professor emeritus of ophthalmology and visual sciences who died in 2013 and left an extraordinary list of enduring contributions to teaching and scholarship spanning six decades. “I’m delighted that Ross Brownson is the first holder of the Bernard Becker Professorship,” said Dr. Edward Lawlor, Brown School dean, the William E. Gordon Distinguished Professor of Social Work and founding director of the university’s Institute for Public Health. “Ross is an eminent scholar whose research is advancing the study and application of chronic disease prevention in America and globally,” Lawlor said. “He is a champion of evidence-based practice in public health and one of the great leaders of the profession.”