| The long and often arduous road that is Dr. Arcelia M. Johnson-Fannin's academic career is composed of bumps, detours and sharp curves, as well as numerous firsts and high achievements. Coming from a family of teachers, it took her many years to realize that teaching was her destiny, although she opposed it all the way. She discovered that in academia she could build something. "I found it is truly where I belong," she said.
Johnson-Fannin has always aimed high and excelled higher. An exceptionally bright child, she completed both second and third grade at the same time, and eventually went on to become high school valedictorian and first in her doctoral class at Mercer University in Atlanta.
While working at New York's Montefiore Hospital, the hospital's then Director of Pharmacy Kurt Kleinman recognized her spark and took an interest in her, sending her to important meetings and assigning her to the most difficult shifts in order for her to grow into a strong leader. "I had huge ambitions -- I wanted his job," Johnson-Fannin said. "He told me that the only way I could have his job someday was to earn a doctorate."
She listened to his advice, earning a doctorate degree and various academic achievements at Mercer University. She soon became one of the four clinical pharmacists asked to help build the Doctor of Pharmacy program at Florida A&M. Within one year with the program she was named director.
Today, Johnson-Fannin is the only female African American to have founded a school of pharmacy and the only female to have started two schools of pharmacy, at University of Incarnate Word and Hampton University. For the past 27 years, she has devoted herself to making change in the industry and empowering her students to take control of their own lives through academic and professional excellence.
"There could not possibly be one thing that I like best about the pharmaceutical field," she said, "but one of the most rewarding experiences is when I can see that my students finally 'get it' and understand the material on a new level. I know that eventually they will make a real change in pharmacy."
Johnson-Fannin also is actively involved in African American organizations and is devoted to sharing medical knowledge, even in her spare time. She spent an entire year in Saudi Arabia working for the government and teaching pharmacology in a medical school for women.
She also enjoys traveling and even made a trek cross-country in a mobile home with her family -- son, Lawrence Marshall, an 11th-grade student; daughter, Ehriel, a senior nursing student at Hampton University; and husband, Larry Fannin, the associate dean at Hampton University.
Never one to turn away from a challenge, Johnson-Fannin believes she still has a lot to contribute. "Before I go to work each day, I think to myself, 'I know there will be challenges today. Am I up to them?'" she said. "And then I think, 'Of course I am! I'm lucky I have these challenges!'"
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