CCR SSSC Organization

John C. Morris, M.D.
Staff Clinician
Metabolism Branch, CCR

I was raised in New York City, the oldest of six children from a working class family from Queens, and the first in my family to attend university. I received my baccalaureate in Biology from Queens College, City University of New York, and my M.D. degree, magna cum laude, from the Upstate Medical Center College of Medicine, State University of New York in Syracuse, NY. After graduation, I did a residency in Internal Medicine and a clinical fellowship in Medical Oncology, both at Mount Sinai Medical Hospital in New York. I am board-certified in Internal Medicine and Medical Oncology. I served as the Chief Medical Resident and subsequently as Assistant Professor of Medicine and Neoplastic Diseases at Mount Sinai Hospital. I then came to the NIH and did a post-doctoral fellowship in the Blaese Laboratory of the Clinical Gene Therapy Branch of the National Human Genome Research Institute. In 1999, I moved to the National Cancer Institute and joined the Metabolism Branch, CCR, NCI as Co-director of Clinical Trials where I have focused on translational clinical trials studying antitumor vaccines, immunostimulatory cytokines such as interleukin-15 and novel monoclonal antibodies such as anti-transforming growth factor-beta for the therapy of cancer.

The last few years have been an unprecedented period of stress and upheaval at the National Cancer Institute as a result of the continuing loss of Principal Investigators, both in the clinics and at the bench, flat and declining budgets in an era of biomedical inflation, limited opportunities for promotion and career advancement for staff scientists and staff clinicians among numerous other issues. An institution as great as the NCI should be able to withstand an occasional "bad" year; however, this almost continued buffeting of the NCI has taken its toll. While the issues are many, we cannot afford to fight a "war" on all fronts. The Staff Scientist (SS)/Staff Clinician (SC) Committee must pick and choose our "battles." The two most important and also the two most difficult issues are to develop a meaningful promotion scheme and career advancement for SS and SC that so desire. Too often these positions are viewed as "limited" with little opportunity for career advancement, or as junior position to take before moving on to some other opportunity. I believe that it is critical that we have a mechanism to advance SS and SC in their careers. The other major issue, as I see it, is that salaries, even compared to outside academia are beginning to lag behind. This is becoming a factor in the recruitment and retention of high quality SS and SC at the NCI. If elected, I promise to work for betterment of NCI's SS and SC work environment and to enhance the opportunities for SS and SC career advancement.