Faculty

William Roberts, MD, MS
Program Director
Dr. Roberts is a graduate of the University of Minnesota Smiley's Family Medicine Residency Program. He spent his childhood in northern Minnesota and high school years in Rochester, Minnesota. Prior to medical school at the University of Minnesota, he attended Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. He is married to a pediatric physical therapist and has three daughters in college and graduate schools. He loves the outdoors and is an avid downhill and Nordic skier, sailor, and backpacker.

Dr. Roberts was in private practice and on the adjunct faculty from 1981 through 2003. In April 2003, he joined the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health faculty as an associate professor. His medical interests are sports medicine, in which he has a sub-specialty certificate, non-surgical orthopedics, and office procedures. He is a fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine and past president; a charter member of the American Medical Society of Sports Medicine; a founding member of the American Road Race Medical Society; the medical director for the Twin Cities Marathon; and a member of the Sports Medicine Advisory committees for the Minnesota State High School League and the USA Soccer Cup. He is the editor-in-chief of McGraw Hill health care information projects; senior associate editor of The Physician and Sports Medicine; and an editorial board member of Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, British Journal of Sports Medicine, Clinical Journal of Sport Medicine, and Current Sports Medicine Reports. His research interests are ice hockey injury, marathon injury, and exertional heat stroke. He has authored many research and educational publications and presents nationally and internationally on sports medicine topics.

Kirby Clark, MD
Associate Program Director
Dr. Clark graduated from the University of Minnesota Medical School and completed his residency at the St. John's Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program. His medical interests include pediatrics, office procedures, adult inpatient medicine, and practice management. He enjoys motorcycling, softball, boating, gardening, and shuffleboard.

Peter Cermak, MD
Faculty Physician
Dr. Cermak received his medical degree from the University of Minnesota and completed an internal medicine residency at Regions Hospital with a subsequent one-year University of Minnesota cardiology fellowship. Prior to joining the faculty in April 2001, Dr. Cermak held a family medicine clinical faculty appointment while in private practice from 1975-2001 and is currently an adjunct professor in the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health. He serves as a full-time hospitalist and attending on the St. John's family medicine teaching service. He was awarded the St. John's Residency Program Teacher of the Year in 1986, 2000, and 2002. Dr. Cermak enjoys gardening, reading, fishing, playing with his grandkids, listening to just about any music, and wine tasting.

Kevin A. Peterson, MD, MPH
Faculty Physician
Dr. Peterson is a graduate of Mayo Medical School and the University of Minnesota Family Medicine Residency Program. He is a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons and has an MPH in epidemiology. He completed a two-year faculty development fellowship in family medicine at the University of Minnesota and joined the faculty in 1993. He works 100 percent on research, with much of his work being done at the Phalen Village Clinic.

Dr. Peterson is the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health principal investigator for the ACCORD Trial (NHLBI), and the director of the MAFP Research Network. He is on the steering committee for the National Diabetes Education Program (NIH, CDC), chairs the Federation of Practice-based Research Networks, and is on the editorial board for the Journal of Family Medicine. Dr. Peterson's medical interests are diabetes management and practice-based research.

Timothy Ronneberg, MD
Faculty Physician
Dr. Ronneberg graduated from the University of Minnesota and completed his residency at St. John's Hospital. He currently coordinates the obstetrics curriculum and serves as an attending on the in-patient teaching service along with Dr. Cermak. His medical interests include obstetrics, adult in-patient medicine, international medicine, and prevention of cardiovascular disease. He enjoys photography, camping, softball, and traveling.

Krista Skorupa, MD
Faculty Physician
Dr. Skorupa graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Medical School. She completed her residency with the St. John's Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program and joined our faculty full time in January 2008. Her medical interests include women's and adolescent health, reproductive health, contraception, HPV, and colposcopy. She enjoys running, cooking, and singing.

George Smith, MD
Faculty Physician
Dr. Smith is a graduate of the University of Minnesota Medical School and completed a family medicine residency at Regions Hospital in St. Paul, Minnesota. He grew up less than one mile from the Phalen Village Clinic, the residency program's family medicine clinic. His wife Chris was a high school Spanish teacher, and they have three children—a rock musician, a filmmaker, and a dancer. Dr. Smith was in private family practice for 24 years in St. Paul. He holds a Certificate of Added Qualification in geriatrics. He has participated in office-based research including ankle injuries, flexible sigmoidoscopy, and depression. He has additional expertise in office practice management.

Tai J. Mendenhall, PhD
Coordinator of Behavioral Medicine
Dr. Mendenhall is a graduate of the University of Minnesota, where he received his PhD degree in marriage and family therapy, specializing in collaborative family health care. A great deal of his training encompassed multidisciplinary efforts across both classroom and clinical contexts. During his doctoral program, he served as the co-director for behavioral health education at Ramsey Family Physicians clinic in St. Paul for three years and completed a year-long intensive training in psychiatry and behavioral medicine at Wake Forest University School of Medicine in North Carolina. Dr. Mendenhall has training in treating child sexual abuse, domestic violence, couples and sex therapy, and working with families who are struggling with a chronic illness. His principal investigative interests include community-engagement and participatory action research, individual and family-oriented diabetes intervention, and motivating patients to adopt and maintain healthy lifestyles. He enjoys teaching, public speaking, motorcycling, antiquing, and home-improvement projects.