May 2, 2024
AUBURN, Alabama - The Harrison College of Pharmacy will hold its 2024 Commencement Monday, May 6 in Neville Arena. Graduates will have the opportunity to hear firsthand about their new profession from Dr. Michael Hogue, current executive vice president and chief executive officer of the American Pharmacists Association.
Hogue assumed his current role in 2023 after a four-year tenure as dean of pharmacy at Loma Linda University in Loma Linda, California.
“Commencement is a special time when we celebrate our students’ accomplishments as they go forward into the world to improve the lives and health of so many,” said Dr. Leigh Ann Ross, dean of the Harrison College of Pharmacy. “We are committed to creating the leaders of tomorrow, and what better way to signify this than to hear directly from one of the top leaders in our profession on this day.”
The Harrison College of Pharmacy will award 121 Doctor of Pharmacy degrees at Monday’s ceremony. Four graduate students will receive their Doctor of Philosophy degrees in pharmaceutical sciences at Friday’s Graduate School Commencement. The Class of 2024 includes representatives from three foreign countries and 15 states. As the public college of pharmacy in the state of Alabama, HCOP continues educating more Alabama pharmacists than anywhere in the world with 84 of the graduates hailing from the state.
"We are proud of our graduates in how they live the Auburn Creed through their educational achievements and now their professional aspirations,” said Ross. “We are excited that Dr. Hogue can be here to share his wisdom and words of inspiration as our graduates take this next step.”
No stranger to Alabama, Hogue received his Pharm.D. from Samford’s McWhorter School of Pharmacy. He then returned to Birmingham and spent nearly 15 years on faculty at Samford, serving a variety of capacities, including professor, department chair, associate dean and interim dean.
A native of southern Illinois, Hogue got an early start in the profession as a pharmacy technician at a community pharmacy in Metropolis. After completing pre-pharmacy coursework at Southern Illinois University, he moved south to finish his degrees at Samford. Upon graduation, he completed a one-year executive residency in association management with the American Pharmacists Association, or APhA, and the National Council for State Pharmacy Association Executives.
Hogue has more than 25 years of experience in community practice as both a pharmacy owner and a staff pharmacist, as well as an ambulatory care provider in family and preventive medicine.
While pursuing his clinical and academic work, he stepped out to take on a number of leadership roles within the profession and APhA, including serving as the organization’s President from 2020-21, Director of Industry Relations from 2000-01 and President of the APhA-Academy of Pharmacy Practice and Management from 2011-13.
He has been very active at the national level related to immunizations, including serving on the original staff development team for APhA’s Pharmacy-Based Immunization Delivery national certificate program for pharmacists and pharmacy technicians, which has now trained over 500,000 pharmacy professionals in the United States.
Hogue has worked in collaboration with state pharmacy associations over the years, resulting in all 50 states authorizing pharmacists to administer vaccines. He was also the first pharmacist appointed by CDC to serve on its COVID-19 vaccine workgroup in April 2020, and he served as APhA’s liaison representative to ACIP from 2020 through 2023. Additionally, he also served on the Adult RSV Vaccine Workgroup for ACIP.
Hogue is married to pharmacist Dr. Heather Hogue, a faculty member in physician assistant studies at California Baptist University. They are parents to two adult daughters who are both in the health care industry.
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Auburn University's Harrison College of Pharmacy is ranked among the top 20 percent of all colleges of pharmacy in the United States, according to U.S. News & World Report. Fully accredited by the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE), the College offers doctoral degrees in pharmacy (Pharm.D.) and pharmaceutical sciences (Ph.D.) while also offering a master's in pharmaceutical sciences and a bachelor’s in drug and biopharmaceutical sciences. The College’s commitment to world-class scholarship and interdisciplinary research speaks to Auburn’s overarching Carnegie R1 designation that places Auburn among the top 100 doctoral research universities in the nation. For more information about the College, please call 334.844.8348 or visit http://pharmacy.auburn.edu.