Joan Hendricks has always loved animals. At the age of six, she would spend her time building houses for dragonflies.
But as she grew up she was always told that girls could never become veterinarians.
Now she runs one of the best veterinary schools in the nation.
Just over a month into her new job, Hendricks has already made herself busy.
She took over as the 12th dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine last month, replacing Alan Kelly, who had held the position for 11 years.
She has spent the past month getting to know her new school, traveling around the nation meeting with donors, legislators, clinicians and researchers in an effort to increase funding for the Vet School.
"It has been very exhilarating," Hendricks said. "For the first month it was a lot of fun. ... I asked myself, 'When does the hard part start?' ... Now it has started."
Hendricks says that one of her main goals is to bring an interdisciplinary approach to the school. She wants to ensure that departments with varied research interests can collaborate, she said.
She added that she hopes to extend this approach to other schools at Penn. She has met with various department chairs within the Vet School and with representatives from the Penn School of Medicine.
Hendricks said she wants to spread the idea that a veterinarian is also involved in research and the study of public health.
Many view veterinarians as a sort of "Vet Barbie" whose only job is to take care of individual pets, she said.
In the long term, however, Hendricks wants to "broaden the public perception of what veterinarians do."
Her colleagues have faith that she is well prepared for the job.
"I think she has a very positive image around the school ... and she comes with an excellent background," said Vet School professor Jay Farrell.
Hendricks served as a faculty member in the Vet School for more than 20 years prior to assuming the deanship and earned both her Ph.D. and V.M.D. at Penn.
She also helped plan the Matthew J. Ryan Veterinary Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania's Center for Critical Care, which brought an emergency room, an intensive-care unit and an anesthesia service together into one area for veterinary use.
Though she was selected internally, Vet School professor Michael Goldschmidt feels that this shouldn't deter her from making changes and looking at things from a different perspective.
"She knows very well what the good points and the bad points for the school are," Goldschmidt said. "She has some idea of how they can be rectified."
He added that the previous dean was also chosen from within the Vet School's faculty, but that Hendricks comes from a different background.
"She brings with her a clinical perspective rather than the perspective of a basic biologist," Goldschmidt said.
