Thomas elected vice-chair of state allied health council

Dr. Stephen Thomas, dean of the East Carolina University College of Allied Health Sciences, has been elected vice-chair of the Council for Allied Health in North Carolina.

Thomas will assume leadership of the council as chair in 2009.

The Council for Allied Health in North Carolina was formed in 1991 by allied health practitioners, educators and employers to ensure that North Carolinians have access to a well-prepared, well-distributed allied health workforce that is representative of the diversity of the state’s communities.

Thomas became dean of the College of Allied Health Sciences in 2003, having served as interim dean since 2001. Previously, he was chairman, professor and graduate program director in the college’s Department of Rehabilitation Studies. He came to ECU in 1980 as an assistant professor and director of the graduate program in vocational evaluation, which he was hired to develop.

Thomas also serves on the North Carolina Institute of Medicine, the board of the Eastern Area Health Education Center, the ECU Medical & Health Sciences Foundation, N.C. Agromedicine Institute and the Governor’s State Sector Strategies: Innovative Workforce Policies to Address Worker and Employee Needs. He is secretary of the Southern Association of Allied Health Deans in Academic Health Centers.

A Houston native, Thomas received a bachelor’s degree in psychology and sociology from Texas Christian University and a master’s and doctorate in rehabilitation from the University of Arizona. He and his wife, Melodie, have two daughters and twin granddaughters.