Dr. Nicolette Warren Powe is Assistant Professor of Public Health in the Department of Health Professions and the Department of Graduate Studies in Health & Rehabilitation Sciences at Youngstown State University. She received a DrPH in Health Education from the Loma Linda University, an MS in Health Promotion/Human Sciences from North Carolina Central University, and a BS in Community Health Education/Healthcare Ethics from Kent State University. Dr. Powe is a public health scientist whose primary interest is behavioral risk factors for chronic disease prevention. Dr. Powe’s research investigates racial/ethnic and sex differences in adherence to cardiometabolic self-management practices, specifically in young adults. Dr. Powe also studies applied health education theories to the implementation of health promotion programs and the dissemination of chronic disease program outcomes. 

Dr. Powe’s work has resulted in the publication of the Racial and Ethnic Approaches to Community Health (REACH) Minority National Organizations (MNO) Success Stories showcasing the health equity projects that worked towards closing the health disparity gap in at least one of the racial and ethnic minority groups. Dr. Powe serves on the Youngstown American Heart Association Board and the Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio Board. She is a member of The Links, Incorporated Youngstown Chapter. She was elected to the Society for Public Health Education (SOPHE) editorial board for Pedagogy in Health Promotion: The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning journal.
 

Dr. Escoffery is a Professor in the department of Behavioral, Health, and Social Sciences at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory. She has studied cancer prevention and control and the uptake of evidence-based interventions for over 15 years. She is the PI of the Emory Cancer Prevention and Control Research Network which is exploring multilevel interventions to increase HPV vaccination among rural residents in GA. She is active in SOPHE at the state and national level.

Laura B. Plunkett, MPH, provides technical assistance and support to 13 U.S. Administration for Community Living (ACL) grant-funded community-based organizations throughout the country who are offering evidence-based falls prevention and chronic disease self-management education. In addition, she also supports and assists with the development and implementation of community-integrated health care initiatives and business acumen activities to increase sustainability efforts of the Aging Network.

Kathleen Zuke has been with the Center for Healthy Aging since 2015. In this role, she works collaboratively with community-based partners across the country to identify, implement, and sustain evidence-based programs that support older adults in staying well and aging in the community, including chronic disease self-management education, falls prevention, and behavioral health.

Program Specialist, Center for Healthy Aging, National Council on Aging: Kate Gibbons provides technical assistance to U.S. Administration for Community Living grantees implementing evidence-based falls prevention and chronic disease self-management education. Additionally, at NCOA, Kate grows and coordinates community educational efforts, develops resources for professionals and aging adults, and supports the Aging Mastery Program.

Yoko Meusch, MA, is a Program Associate for the Center for Healthy Aging at National Council on Aging. Yoko provides technical assistance to U.S. Administration for Community Living (ACL) grant-funded community-based organizations promoting and implementing evidence-based Falls Prevention and Chronic Disease Self-Management education programs. In addition, she is a program administrator for Aging Mastery Program®, an NCOA’s signature program for aging well. 

Yoko holds a Bachelor's degree in Management Studies from the University of Maryland Global Campus and a Master's Degree in Health Communication from Johns Hopkins University.

Julie Friedman, MPH is a member of the LA County Sexual and Gender Diverse Women’s Health Collaborative and as the director of the Iris Cantor-UCLA Women’s Health Education and Research Center, she oversees the operation of the Collaborative. At the Center, her work focuses on the social determinants of women’s health. In collaboration with cross-sector partners, she engages in education, research, and advocacy initiatives focused on vulnerable women in LA County to advance their health across the lifespan. Previously she was the executive director of the Early Childhood Parenting Center, managed the employee health promotion program at the Los Angeles Times, and was a consultant with Growing Health Partnerships working with nonprofit organizations. She has published articles on worksite wellness, health promotion, and women’s health. She serves as a Board of Supervisors appointee to the LA County Commission for Women where she is the Chair of the Health Committee.   

Sequoia Thompson is a Steering Committee member of the LA County Sexual and Gender Diverse Women’s Health Collaborative. As a healer through dialogue, Sequoia utilizes her background in psychology and craft as a motivational speaker, and somatic dialogue facilitator to empower her audience to see themselves as changemakers who create spaces that offer dignity, holistic care, and psychological safety for all identities and ways of being.

Sequoia incorporates storytelling to humanize discussions around Intersectional Identity, Inclusive Language, Racial Equity, and Accountability. This pairing of storytelling and administrative decolonizing creates an impactful ambiance for transformational and sustainable change. Her transnational research investigating European and American heteronormative colonialism fuels her passion for social justice and QTBIPOC advocacy. 
Sequoia is an ardent advocate for mental health and incorporates her journey through Major Depressive Disorder to empower those who may not have the resources to understand the condition and thrive through and with it.

Gabrielle Agana Pascua is a consultant for the City of West Hollywood, serving as the Training Coordinator for the LA County Sexual & Gender Diverse Women’s Health Collaborative. She is also the Program Coordinator for the Iris Cantor – UCLA Women’s Health Education & Research Center, where she previously was an intern. She graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2023 with a Bachelor of Science in Human Biology & Society. Throughout her undergraduate education, Gabrielle volunteered with UCLA’s Mobile Clinic Project as a Caseworker and member of the Health Education Committee. She brought street-side clinic access to West Hollywood at sites such as Salvation Army, the Los Angeles LGBT Center, and Hollywood Food Coalition. She now volunteers with UCLA’s Companion Care, which seeks to build sustainable bridges and establish a continuum of care between people experiencing homelessness with existing health and social services network in Los Angeles.

Dr. Jody Vogelzang, a nationally recognized speaker, researcher, registered dietitian, and health education specialist, is an expert in community health who has spent the last two decades teaching in higher education.  Her peers have formally recognized her for excellence in professional practice (Excellence in Public Health Nutrition (AND) and Achievements in Public Health Nutrition (APA) and for dedication to the high standards of the nutrition and dietetics profession through active participation, leadership, and devotion to serving others in nutrition and dietetics, as well as allied health fields (AND Medallion Award).  
She holds a bachelor’s degree in dietetics from Michigan State University, a Master's Degree in Health Science from Grand Valley State University, a Master's of Arts in Biology from Miami University, and a Doctorate in Health Services specializing in community health from Walden University. She regularly volunteers in professional and community organizations locally, nationally, and internationally.

Sely-Ann Johnson, PhD, brings diverse expertise in public health, teaching, research, and epidemiology, focusing on disaster preparedness, prevention, and food safety. In her previous role at the CDC Foundation, she served as an epidemiologist, overseeing multiple analytic projects. Her duties involved developing project summaries and data briefs, implementing process improvements, overseeing the creation of Tableau visualizations, and analyzing data to produce actionable outputs for stakeholders. She currently teaches public health courses at Ball State University and Perdue Global. Dr. Johnson holds a Ph.D. in Health Education and a Master of Public Health from the University of Toledo.

Dr. Kanekar is an Associate Professor and Graduate Program Coordinator for Health Education and Health Promotion at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. His fourteen years of teaching experience involves more than 30 different courses (undergraduate and graduate) in the areas of public health, health education, and health promotion. Recipient of numerous teaching awards at the international, national, and local levels, his pedagogical techniques involve online –distance learning, hybrid, and face-to-face courses. His research areas of interest focus on adolescent health, measurement in health education, global health, online and hybrid pedagogy, and health behavior interventions. He currently serves on the Society for Public Health Education Ethics Committee and Editorial Board of the American Journal of Public Health and Journal of Alcohol and Drug Education at the national level and as Member at Large Finance at the Arkansas Society for Public Health Education at the state level.

Yuliya Shneyderman, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Health Education at the Borough of Manhattan Community College. She co-coordinates the Associate in Science degree in Public Health. Her research interests are environmental health, sexual and reproductive health, and vaccine hesitancy. She serves on the SOPHE Ethics Committee.

Dr. Stacey Fisher is a population health researcher and epidemiologist with the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute in Ottawa, Canada. She has expertise in population health research including the development and use of predictive risk algorithms, equitable artificial intelligence for public health, web-based risk communication, and health services research using large administrative health data. She received her PhD in Epidemiology from the University of Ottawa, after which she worked with Public Health Ontario, funded by a national Health System Impact Fellowship in equitable artificial intelligence. In this position she built capacity for machine learning among Canadian public health professionals, and advised the development of both national and provincial strategies for using artificial intelligence for public health.

Dr. Joe Smyser is the Chief Executive Officer of PGP. Dr. Smyser has created the strategies for several of the world’s largest and most successful behavior change campaigns and programs. The methodologies he has championed, such as media monitoring for disease surveillance, disseminating health information through community influencers and organizations, and rigorous peer-review regardless of a program’s scale, are now widely recognized as best practices.

He is an advocate for leveraging the tools and techniques of private industry for public health, increasing public-private partnerships, and fostering private industry innovation for the public good. Dr. Smyser’s academic background includes a PhD and masters in public health and a postdoc at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention through its evaluation fellowship. Additionally, he interned at the U.S. Food & Drug Administration within the Office of International Programs. He is a returned Peace Corps volunteer, having served in Swaziland. A regular and dynamic speaker and trainer, Dr. Smyser frequently delivers keynote addresses and contributes as a panelist with other experts. He has been a full-time instructor at Columbia University and San Diego State University.

Gigi Holder currently serves as the program director for the Child Access to Mental Health and Psychiatry (CHAMP) program operated out of the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC) in Jackson. In this role, Gigi operates the day-to-day activities which vastly involve providing resources and referrals, and education to primary care providers across the state when they call the consultation phone line to speak to a mental health specialist regarding the care of their pediatric patients. The mission of CHAMP is to address the lack of mental health resources across Mississippi by allowing for same-day, peer to peer consultation between a medical provider and a social worker, child psychologist, or child psychiatrist so that behavioral and emotional concerns can be addressed without the need for unnecessary referral delay for services.

Prior to this position, Gigi completed a 2-year postgraduate fellowship with the Mississippi Thrive! Child Health and Development Project which was a comprised of a multidisciplinary team conducting developmental assessments for children up to age 6 at the Center for Advancement of Youth (CAY) at UMMC. As a clinician, she continues to provide therapy services to families with children aged 2 to 7 regarding behavioral concerns as well as exposure to trauma events for young children and adolescents. 

Gigi earned her bachelor’s degree in Health Education from the University of Arkansas in her hometown of Fayetteville, AR, and later received a Master's of Public Health and a Master's of Social Work from the Dual Degree Program in New Mexico State University in Las Cruces. Through all of this, her involvement with SOPHE has remained steadfast from maintaining her CHES credentialing to serving in leadership roles in both the House of Delegates and on the Board of Trustees for National SOPHE. 

Siobhan Fitzpatrick is a Technical Officer in the Health Workforce Department at the World Health Organization in Geneva. With a combined background spanning fifteen years in health worker education and training, Siobhan currently undertakes the development of policies, norms and standards to inform investment in health workforce education, employment and retention towards the achievement of universal health coverage and the Sustainable Development Goals. She coordinates the Global Health Workforce Network Education Hub and provides technical advice on strengthening health worker education across a range of areas universal health coverage, lifelong learning, and human resources for health leadership and management. Most recently, she led Action Area 2 competency-based education of the WHO and partner roadmap National workforce capacity to implement the essential public health functions including a focus on emergency preparedness and response. 

Suzanne Maman, a social scientist trained in public health, is a professor in the Department of Health Behavior and is associate dean for global health at the Gillings School. Dr. Maman serves as co-lead for the Master of Public Health (MPH) program’s global health concentration, which she helped to develop. She also serves as UNC faculty director at the Duke-UNC Rotary Peace Center. Dr. Maman has been developing, implementing and evaluating HIV and violence prevention programs in sub-Saharan Africa for 20 years. She collaborates with the World Health Organization (WHO), the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and other governmental health agencies and educational institutions in the U.S. and globally to advance this work. Her work on how violence increases women’s risk for HIV infection, and how an HIV diagnosis may affect women’s experiences with violence, has informed programs in Tanzania and South Africa. Maman's work has also led to WHO guidance and clinical tools to support women during the HIV testing process. In addition, she teaches a skills-based qualitative research methods course that is required for master's students in health behavior.

As associate dean for global health, Maman works closely with colleagues within the Gillings School’s Research, Innovation and Global Solutions unit to integrate global initiatives into innovation, entrepreneurship and research, and lead programming that supports the School’s domestic and international students. She also partners with key research centers and institutes, including UNC’s Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases (IGHID) and the Gillings. 

Dr. Judith Monroe, president and CEO of the CDC Foundation, has dedicated her career to protecting people and saving lives. She joined the CDC Foundation in February 2016 as president and CEO, following her role as a deputy director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and director of CDC’s Office of State, Tribal, Local and Territorial Support. In her work at the CDC Foundation, Dr. Monroe advances priority programs that improve the health of people across America and around the world. The CDC Foundation mobilizes philanthropic and private-sector resources to support CDC’s critical health protection work, managing hundreds of programs in the United States and in more than 90 countries. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the CDC Foundation supported the work of CDC, U.S. public health departments and low- and middle-income countries. Under Dr. Monroe’s leadership, the CDC Foundation provided support to disproportionately affected populations; procured personal protection equipment for frontline health workers; supported critical research, hired more than 4,000 surge staff; and provided technical assistance and grants to more than 350 community-based organizations.

The CDC Foundation under Dr. Monroe’s leadership also responded to the Zika epidemic as an implementing partner in addition to mobilizing resources; supported the response and recovery from the 2017 hurricane season; and serves as a strategic partner to CDC for global health security.
Prior to the CDC Foundation, Dr. Monroe oversaw key activities and technical assistance at CDC supporting the nation’s health departments and the public health system. Throughout the 2014–15 Ebola epidemic she served as senior advisor for the domestic response. During her tenure as the state health commissioner for Indiana she served as president of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials through the H1N1 pandemic. She envisioned and founded the ASTHO president’s challenge in 2008. This leadership platform resulted in initiatives with significant health improvements and focus of ASTHO annual meetings. Dr. Monroe is a member of the Milken Institute’s Public Health Advisory Board and Executive Circle, the COVID Collaborative, the Advisory Council of the Pandemic Action Network and the APHA Alliance for Disease Prevention and Response. She serves as a member of the World Health Organization Foundation’s Strategic Advisory Group, WHAM global Board, Advancing a Healthier Wisconsin Endowment Advisory Committee, Woman of Impact, Texas Biomedical Research Institute’s Strategic Advisory Council and is a member of the Atlanta Rotary Club and International Women’s Forum. Additionally, she co-chaired Gov. Holcomb’s public health commission aimed at modernizing the public health system in Indiana.

Among her many awards, Dr. Monroe was recognized as one of Atlanta’s Most Admired CEOs for 2021 by the Atlanta Business Chronicle; awarded the United Way of Greater Atlanta Woman of Excellence Award; received the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce MAC Heroes of Global Health award; the Indiana Commission on Women Torchbearer Award and APHL Presidential Award. Dr. Monroe received the American Public Health Association’s (APHA) Presidential Citation for her work to improve the health and well-being of people around the world, and for her commitment to the future of public health as a mentor to young physicians and public health students. Dr. Monroe received her doctor of medicine from the University of Maryland and a bachelor of science degree from Eastern Kentucky University. She completed her residency in family medicine at the University of Cincinnati, a rural faculty development fellowship through East Tennessee State University, and a mini-fellowship in obstetrics through the University of Wisconsin. She also participated in the State Health Leadership Initiative at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and received an honorary doctorate from Purdue University in Health and Human Services.

Ninez A. Ponce, PhD, MPP (BS UC Berkeley; MPP Harvard; PhD UCLA), is Professor and Endowed Chair in the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, Director of the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, and Principal Investigator for the California Health Interview Survey, the largest state survey in the USA. Dr. Ponce is an elected member of the National Academy of Social Insurance and has served on the Board of Scientific Counselors, National Center for Health Statistics.  She has participated in committees for the National Academy of Medicine and the National Quality Forum, where her expertise has focused on setting guidance for health systems in the measurement and use of social determinants of health as tools to monitor health equity.  She has received numerous awards from community organizations recognizing her work in community-engaged research. In 2019 Dr. Ponce and her team received the AcademyHealth Impact award for their contributions to population health measurement to inform public policies. In 2021, Dr. Ponce served as a Commissioner for the RWJF Transforming Public Health Data Initiative and currently serves on the Data Disaggregation workgroup for the White House Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander Commission. Currently, she is an Associate Editor for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at JAMA Health Forum and is on the editorial boards of Milbank Quarterly, Health Services Research and Health Affairs. Dr. Ponce champions better data, especially for people from marginalized racial and ethnic, sexual orientation and gender identity, and immigrant populations.  She firmly believes that equity-centered data will lead to more meaningful program and policy inferences and better care for overlooked groups.

William M. Rodgers III is vice president and director of the Institute for Economic Equity at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Before joining the Fed, Rodgers served as professor of public policy and chief economist at the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. He also served as a visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta during 2021.Rodgers is an elected member of the National Academy of Social Insurance and served as its board chair for the last five years. He also serves as treasurer for the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. Rodgers is a nonresident fellow at The Century Foundation and has served in many public capacities, including on President Obama’s Department of Labor transition team and as chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor from 2000 to 2001. He served on the National Economic Association Board and is a past president. Rodgers also served on the U.S. Board of United Way Worldwide and currently works on the Board of Trustees of McDaniel College. He chairs the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s expert panel to evaluate the quality of compensation data collected from U.S. employers by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.His areas of expertise include compensation, pay equity, diversity and inclusion, labor market, and general economic trends. Rodgers has published articles in the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, the Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, the Review of Black Political Economy, and Family Economics and Nutrition Review. His book, The Handbook on the Economics of Discrimination, was selected by Choice, the review journal of the American Library Association, as an Outstanding Academic

Orvin Kimbrough serves as the Chairman and CEO of Midwest BankCentre, where he helps to empower people, enable businesses and energize neighborhoods through the strength of the Bank’s financial services. Midwest BankCentre is St. Louis’ 2nd largest privately owned local bank, with over $2.5 billion in assets and over $2 billion in loans. Under Orv’s leadership, Midwest BankCentre creates the conditions that allow everyone to DREAM BIG and RISE TOGETHER.Prior to joining Midwest BankCentre, Orv spent nearly 20 years in leadership roles in prominent nonprofit agencies, most recently as the president and CEO of the United Way of Greater St. Louis. During his tenure as CEO, the United Way of St. Louis grew to the nation’s largest affiliate, raising nearly $80 million annually. Orv started with United Way in 2007 as vice president of major gifts.Orv is unlike any other bank CEO in the nation. From humble beginnings, he became an inspiring leader who has boosted the life trajectory of tens of thousands of people through his work in the nonprofit sector, while becoming the first and only African American to lead one of the 100+ mainstream banks in the St. Louis region.

During his 20-plus years in philanthropy, Dr. Dwayne Proctor has always worked to ensure that American communities were healthy and thriving. He joined MFH as President and CEO in 2021. The Foundation works to improve health through collaboration, convening, knowledge sharing and strategic investment, never losing sight of the equity lens that shapes all its work. Under his leadership, MFH strives to become an antiracist institution that fairly targets its resources to achieve health equity in Missouri by 2023. The Foundation recently launched a 20-year Food Justice strategic initiative to build collaborative efforts and galvanize shifts in current policies and practices that shape the way Missourians eat. MFH works to address a diverse mix of pressing issues across the state, including Medicaid expansion, childhood obesity, firearm violence and suicide prevention, crisis response, and behavioral health. The Foundation works on several strategic initiatives focused on women’s health, such as access to contraception, and infant health and vitality.Before his time at MFH, he served in a variety of roles at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. In 2005, Dr. Proctor was tapped to lead RWJF’s national strategies to reverse the rise in childhood obesity rates. In this role, he collaborated with his colleagues to promote effective changes to public policies and industry practices, test and demonstrate innovative community and school-based environmental changes and leverage sustainable changes using both “grassroots” and “treetops” advocacy approaches to educate local and national leaders on their roles and opportunities to prevent childhood obesity.

A leading expert in chronic disease prevention and an internationally-recognized expert in the area of dissemination and implementation science, Ross C. Brownson is regarded as one of the academic and practice leaders in the field of evidence-based public health. Brownson has a joint appointment with the university’s School of Medicine in the Department of Surgery and the Siteman Cancer Center.

Brownson directs the Prevention Research Center, a center that develops innovative research to speed the translation of scientific findings to use in public health settings. His research has been supported by a broad array of federal and foundation sources, including the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

He is an associate editor of the Annual Review of Public Health and on the editorial board of five other journals. Brownson has published over 600 articles and 17 books including: “Chronic Disease Epidemiology, Prevention, and Control,” “Evidence-Based Public Health,” and “Dissemination and Implementation Research in Health: Translating Science to Practice.” He has been listed as one of the “World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds.” Brownson is past-president of the American College of Epidemiology and the National Association of Chronic Disease Directors. Brownson is also active in the American Public Health Association.

Raffy R. Luquis is an associate professor of health education in the School of Behavioral Sciences and Education at Penn State Harrisburg. Dr. Luquis also serves as the professor-in-charge of the of the health education master’s degree and the program coordinator for the biobehavioral health undergraduate’ degree. Dr. Luquis has a broad background in health education and health promotion. His primary teaching and research interests are cultural competency and multicultural health, health promotion, and human sexuality. He earned the certified health education specialist credential in 1995 and the master certified health education specialist credential in 2011 from the National Commission for Health Education Credentialing in 2011. He served in the SOPHE Board of Trustees from 2016-2020.