Our Mission

The mission of the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center for Research on Human Development is to improve the quality of life of persons with disorders of thinking, learning, perception, communication, mood and emotion caused by disruption of typical development. We are dedicated to improving the lives of children and adults with disabilities by embracing core values that include:

• the pursuit of scientific knowledge with creativity and purpose
• the dissemination of information to scientists, practitioners, families, and community leaders
• the facilitation of discovery by Vanderbilt Kennedy Center scientists
• the translation of knowledge into practice

The Center was founded in 1965 at Peabody College as the second nationally designated National Institutes of Health Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center. Today, it is part of a national network of 14 centers supported in part since its inception by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. In 2005, the Center was designated a University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities, Education, Research, and Service by the U.S. Administration on Developmental Disabilities, a network of 67 centers in all U.S. states and territories.

The Vanderbilt Kennedy Center has evolved into an interdisciplinary research, training, diagnosis, and treatment institute, embracing faculty and resources available through Vanderbilt University Medical Center, the College of Arts and Science, and Peabody College of Education and Human Development. The Center brings together scientists and practitioners in behavior, education, genetics, and neuroscience to work together in unique ways to solve the mysteries of development and learning.

Will McMillan checks out a DNA model with Randy Blakely, Ph.D.