News — Black Media

The Gondar College of Medical Sciences is located in Gondar in the northwestern part of Ethiopia.  The college, founded in 1954, is the oldest health professional training institute in Ethiopia.

The medical college was located in Gondar in 1954 in part because of the malaria epidemic that devastated the region during 1952 and 1953.  The college was designed to educate various health care workers in a manner that would allow them to address the particular health needs of rural Ethiopia. While most professional training institutions focus on preparing graduates to understand the disease processes as they affect individuals and especially on diagnosis and management, Gondar College has emphasized preventative medicine and focused on public health (community health) in its training, service, and research activities.

In 1961 the college was placed under the direction of the Haile Selassie I University, now known as Addis Ababa University. The college also offered for the first time a bachelor of science degree in Public Health. Over the next 20 years, the college played a prominent role in preparing over 1,100 professionals. In 1978 the institution was authorized to establish a medical school to train doctors, health officers, community nurses, and other health professionals. Since 1979 when the first class enrolled in the school’s medical program, the program has grown both in size and function. In 1994, the college was renamed the Gondar College of Medical Sciences (GCMS), and its mission was redefined to include the basic research in health sciences and to serve as a referral health center for the region.

The college is at present undertaking various projects for expansion of its activities including construction of a new library, a student dormitory, classrooms, and science laboratories. It increased its student enrollment by 30% with the 2009 school year.

Today GCMS has over 2,000 students enrolled in medical and health science fields ranging from nursing and public health to internal medicine, surgery, pediatrics, obstetrics/gynecology, radiology, dentistry, and orthopedics. The students are recruited from all regions of Ethiopia.

In 2004 GCMS became part of the University of Gondar.   The entire university has 11,000 regular students and 6,000 extension students in 35 undergraduate programs and 8 graduate programs.

Byron Allen, the chairman and CEO of the Allen Media Group and owner of the Weather Channel, has settled and withdrawn his $10 billion racial discrimination lawsuit against Charter Communications.

Both Allen and Charter Communications announced the settlement in a joint statement Wednesday. The settlement follows one between Allen and Comcast last summer in which Comcast agreed to carry several of Allen’s channels.

In 2015, the former Real People actor sued both Charter and Comcast for $20 billion alleging the companies weren’t carrying his TV channels due to racism. The suit made it to the Supreme Court, but the high court struck down his arguments in a 9-0 decision, saying it was not enough to assert that race was one of several factors in not picking up his channels, he had to show it was a critical factor in not picking up the channel.

With Charter and Allen settling, the suit is officially over. The terms between Allen and Charter have not been released, but if it’s anything close to his settlement with Comcast, Charter will pick up some of Allen’s channels.

The Allen Media Group owns 16 power four (ABC-NBC-CBS-FOX) affiliate broadcast stations and 10, 24-hour networks including the Weather Channel, Pets.TV, and Comedy.TV. The group also has active license agreements for stations in the Bahamas, Canada, South Africa, and New Zealand.

The former stand-up comedian told the Hollywood Reporter last year that he wants to own CNN one day and he will.

“I’m close to the same age when Rupert Murdoch came here to America,” Allen told the Reporter in an interview published July 9. “He was in his 50s. I’m 59. What you see today will be 10,000 times bigger.”

When pressed on what would make the ultimate jewel in his crown, without hesitation, the media mogul replied, “I’d love to own CNN. But I have to buy AT&T to do that. And I will. Believe me, I think about it every day.”