Paula Johnson, president of Wellesley College, recently received the 2025 Cato T. Laurencin Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Medical Association. Considered one of the association’s highest honors, the award recognizes Dr. Johnson’s career-long contributions to medical research, women’s health, health equity, and leadership in science and education.
On July 1, 2016, Dr. Johnson became the first African American president of Wellesley College, a women’s liberal arts educational institution in Massachusetts. Before her presidential appointment, she was a professor at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health.
While at Harvard, Dr. Johnson founded and served as the executive director of the Connors Center for Women’s Health and Gender Biology at Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where she also served as chief of the division of women’s health. There, she developed an innovative model for sustainable improvements in women’s health. Her framework – which includes insights from biomedical research, clinical care, health policy, global health, and interdisciplinary education – has become a national blueprint for advancing gender equity in medicine.
A native of Brooklyn, New York, Dr. Johnson holds a bachelor’s degree, a medical degree, and a master of public health degree, all from Harvard University