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About Our Director
Marcia G. Ory, PhD, MPH is an internationally recognized thought leader with a long history of excellence in research, education and practice on healthy aging and strategies for ensuring optimal aging across the entire life-course. She grew up in Dallas, Texas where at an early age she had an appreciation of successful aging through observing the life trajectories of her mother and grandmother who both lived well into their 90s. They inspired her to be a first generation college graduate and embark on life-long learning and teaching. She holds degrees from The University of Texas at Austin (BA 1971); Indiana University (MA 1972); Purdue University (PhD 1976) and Johns Hopkins (MPH 1981).
With a passion for public service, she spent twenty years at the National Institute on Aging in Bethesda Maryland from 1981-2001 developing and mentoring others to implement a national research agenda around factors leading to aging well, emphasizing the dynamic interplay of self care, family care, and formal care services. With a desire to return to Texas and be closer to family, she joined the faculty at the Texas A&M School of Public Health (2001) to address critical public health issues affecting an aging population. As a Regents and Distinguished Professor, she founded the Texas A&M Center for Population Health and Aging which she directed from 2016-2021.
Her life-long work underscores a paradigm shift in viewing healthy aging as new normal and encouraging the population to be active for life—everyone, every day, and every age. She is founding the non-profit Healthy Across the Generations to emphasize the importance of translating research into practice that can make a difference in the lives of individuals, their families, and communities.
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