Dr. Whitaker earned a master’s of public health from Harvard in 1991 and a medical degree from the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine in 1993. He completed his primary care and internal medicine residency at San Francisco General Hospital. In 2003, Dr. Whitaker became director of the Illinois State Department of Public Health. In 2007, he joined the University of Chicago Medical Center as its executive vice president for strategic alliances. His appointment at the University of Chicago included responsibility for community-based research to build a network of partnerships to broaden urban medical services. Prior to 2003, Whitaker was an attending physician in internal medicine at John H. Stroger, Jr. Hospital’s collaborative research unit. In 1998, he helped found Project Brotherhood: a Black Men’s Clinic, a weekly clinic for African-American men housed in Woodlawn Adult Health Center on Chicago’s South Side. Whitaker also is an assistant professor at Rush Medical College’s Department of Medicine and Preventive Medicine and maintains his clinical association with Project Brotherhood.