Department of Exercise and Sport Science

Debra (Deb) J. C. Murray has been a faculty member at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill since 1985 and has served in many capacities within the Department of Exercise and Sport Science (EXSS) and the university community.  She was the Founder and Director of the Undergraduate Internship Athletic Training Program from 1985-1995, Aquatics Director from 2010- 2014 and Health Education Coordinator from 1995- present.  For most of her tenure, she has also been Coordinator and Instructor for the Adapted Lifetime Fitness Course which encompasses designing and implementing individualized fitness programs for undergraduate students with physical accessibility restrictions.

Deb’s Bachelor of Science Degree in Physical Education with a concentration in Athletic Training originated at Springfield College and concluded at Ithaca College.  She earned her Master of Arts Degree in Physical Education with a specialization in Athletic Training at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Prior to her employment at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Deb was an Assistant Athletic Trainer and Instructor at Cornell University for three years and served as the Coordinator of the Undergraduate and Graduate Student Athletic Trainers.

Outside of her responsibilities within the EXSS Department, Deb has demonstrated her passion for mentoring UNC undergraduate students.  In particular, she has served as the Faculty Advisor for the Phi Beta Chi Panhellenic Social Sorority since 2007.  In this role she has been instrumental in guiding decisions about leadership styles, finances, event organization and administration, conflict resolution, time and stress management, academic strategies and personal lifestyle choices within the membership of forty to one hundred and sixty women per year.  She was recognized as the Outstanding Faculty UNC Advisor by Carolina Fraternity and Sorority Life in 2008, 2009, 2011, 2018 and 2019.  She was also awarded “Advisor of the Year” by National Phi Beta Chi in 2019 and Carolina Women’s Leadership Council Faculty to Undergraduate Mentoring Award in 2020.  Additionally, Deb has shown her desire to make a dramatic impact with the undergraduate population by acting as a volunteer live-in sorority House Director for five years and denotes those years of daily immersion with the students as some of her favorites at the university.

Johna Register-Mihalik, PhD, LAT, ATC joined the Department of Exercise and Sport Science as an assistant professor in July of 2014. Dr. Register-Mihalik also serves as a Research Scientist at the Injury Prevention Research Center here at UNC-CH. She completed her undergraduate work at the University of Alabama in 2004 in Athletic Training and both her graduate (MA-2006; PhD-2010) and postdoctoral training (2012) at UNC-Chapel Hill. Prior to joining the faculty in Exercise and Sport Science, she served as the Senior Research Associate in the Emergency Services Institute at WakeMed Health & Hospitals in Raleigh, NC. In addition, she currently serves on NATA’s Convention Programming and Pronouncements Committees as well as the North Carolina High School Athletic Association’s Sports Medicine Advisory Committee. She currently resides in Durham with her husband Jason, daughter Jenna, and son John.

Dr. Register-Mihalik’s research interests include the negative consequences, prevention, education and clinical management of sport and recreationally related traumatic brain injury (TBI). Her primary work centers on improved care, education and behavior change concerning TBI among physically active children and adolescents. In the future, she hopes to expand these injury prevention methodologies to other settings and injuries. Her work has been published in a variety of journals across the sports medicine and brain injury literature. Dr. Register-Mihalik is also an active member of many professional organizations including the National Athletic Trainers’ Association (NATA) and the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM). She was the 2018 recipient of the National Athletic Trainers’ Association New Investigator Award. She was awarded fellowship to the American College of Sports Medicine in 2020.

Dr. Smith is a social scientist in the area of Sport Administration, focused on the social impact of sport.

Dr. Smith-Ryan’s research interests center around exercise and nutrition interventions to modify various aspects of body composition, cardiovascular health, and metabolic function. She is an active researcher in the field of metabolism, sport nutrition and exercise performance, in both healthy and clinical populations, leading projects funded by the National Institutes of Health and International and National industry sponsored clinical trials.

Dr. Weight facilitates data-driven decision making in intercollegiate athletics and explores the educational impact of elite sport participation.