LEEAD Scholar 2017-18 Cohort
A. Christson Adedoyin, MSW, PhD
Dr. A. Christson Adedoyin is currently Professor of Social Work in the Department of Social Work, School of Public Health, Samford University, and Birmingham, Alabama. His research interests include: Evidence synthesis and program evaluation of (faith-based) social services and innovative program interventions to address educational, socio-economic, and health disparities among African Americans, African Immigrants and African Refugees.
Chad E. Kee, PhD
Dr. Chad Kee is the Founder & CEO of WhitworthKee Consulting, LLC. He has over 15 years of secondary and postsecondary educational administration work, program evaluation, grants management with various higher education institutions, and government agencies. Most of his career has been spent on improving the experiences and completion rates of college students with specific focus on underrepresented populations including racial minority groups, non-traditional students, veterans, and students with disabilities. He has extensive experience in curricular and co-curricular program design, implementation, and evaluation.
Dr. Kee served as a government employee for the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) and the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) coordinating Career and Technical Education programs and managing grant funds for No Child Left Behind. Prior to government employment, Dr. Kee served as an administrator in higher education. During this time, coordinating diversity and inclusion training for faculty and staff, teaching first-year experience courses, and implementing co-curricular learning opportunities. Dr. Kee has worked diligently to strengthen campus environments in order to establish welcoming communities and to promote student engagement.
Chandria Jones, PhD, MPH
Dr. Chandria Jones has extensive research and evaluation experience in public health focusing on youth-related areas such as behavioral health, homelessness, obesity, health equity, and health communication. Trained in epidemiology and behavioral and community health, her research focuses on social and environmental determinants of health for vulnerable populations such as racial and ethnic minorities, low-income youth and families, and individuals with mental health and substance use disorders. Her research emphasizes the need to go beyond individual behavior change to understand the social, cultural, and physical environments in which people live, that either encourage or inhibit opportunities for health and well-being. As a Senior Study Director at Westat, Dr. Jones has worked on projects for federal agencies such as the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and for foundations like the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Annie E. Casey Foundation.
David Garcia, EdD
Dr. David Garcia is a bi-cultural, Xicano transplant to New York from Texas, via the Midwest and Seattle. He possesses over twenty years of experience in public health management including a proven record in disease prevention, treatment, testing, support, and access to care to culturally diverse populations. He earned a Doctorate in Health Education and Behavior from Columbia University Teachers College and a Master of Public Health from the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston. Dr. Garcia is dedicated to working with diverse communities to educate, empower, and organize them towards improving their health outcomes, thereby reducing racial ethnic health disparities. He is currently the Director of Capacity Building, Research and Evaluation for the Latino Commission on AIDS and serves as an Adjunct Assistant Professor in Health Education for Hostos Community College in the Bronx. Originally from San Antonio-Texas, Dr. Garcia enjoys dancing in front of mirrors, science fiction, fashion, and knowing everything about Beyoncé.
Dayna Alexander, DrPH, MSPH
Dr. Dayna Alexander is an Adjunct Instructor at Concordia University and a Health Scientist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As a Health Scientist, she serves as an adolescent girl and young women subject matter expert providing technical support to Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe on HIV programs and interventions. She utilizes community engagement and mobilization strategies to ensure adoption and sustainment of healthy lifestyle habits among community members. Dr. Alexander has over 10 years of experience successfully designing, implementing, and evaluating health disparity and inequity initiatives in academic-, clinical-, and faith-based organizations and government agencies using qualitative and quantitative methods. Her research and evaluation interests include community health, sexual and reproductive health, patient-provider communication, and chronic conditions (HIV, diabetes, and obesity). She earned her Doctor of Public Health in Community Health Behavior and Education from Georgia Southern University. She enjoys reading, traveling, dancing, and spending time with loved ones.
Emily Calderón Galdeano, EdD
Dr. Emily Calderón Galdeano is a bilingual advocate, scholar, educator, and evaluator with nearly 20 years in the education policy arena at federal, state, local, and institutional levels. She is the CEO of Elevate Consulting Group, which provides evaluation and data storytelling services. Emily also serves as the Executive Director of the Texas Senate Hispanic Caucus. In her prior role as Director of Research for two national organizations, Dr. Calderón Galdeano integrated research, policy, and data to help accelerate student success in higher education. She has served as a university faculty member and is the co-editor of an international award-winning book, Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs): Advancing Research and Transformative Practice that focuses on the group of institutions where 66% of Latino undergraduates choose to enroll. Emily is a co-founder of Fiesta Wishes, a nonprofit organization celebrating birthdays for foster and homeless children to inspire hope, create memories, and bring smiles.
Felisa Gonzales, PhD, MPH
Dr. Felisa Gonzales is the Evaluation and Learning Manager at The Colorado Trust. She is trained in applied social psychology and epidemiology and has more than 10 years of experience conducting research on health disparities affecting populations of color. Findings from her research studies and collaborations are documented in 20 peer-reviewed publications, 2 book chapters, and 2 reports. In her current position at The Colorado Trust, Felisa oversees the evaluation of a health equity advocacy strategy that aims to establish a field of advocates who can promote health equity through policy.
Gail Dana-Sacco, PhD
Dr. Gail Dana-Sacco, Passamaquoddy, applies her research experience in Native communities and her knowledge of Native American health to develop and implement community driven interventions to restore strong, healthy Native communities. Her critical inquiry examines persistent health inequities to identify policy levers and structural changes needed to improve Native health and self-sufficiency. Through Wayfinders for Health she provides public health research, evaluation and consulting services. In her position as Associate Faculty at the Johns Hopkins Center for American Indian Health, she collaborates with a national research team developing and testing interventions to improve outcomes for Native and immigrant women experiencing intimate partner violence.
Isabel Cuervo, PhD
Dr. Isabel Cuervo is a Senior Research Associate and currently works at the Barry Commoner Center for Health and the Environment at Queens College, City University of New York (CUNY) on bilingual, inter-institutional community-engaged research, evaluation, and service projects focused on environmental and immigrant workers’ health. Dr. Cuervo attained her doctoral degree in Environmental Psychology from The CUNY Graduate Center and attended Barnard College for undergraduate studies. Dr. Cuervo grew up in Queens and her family is originally from Colombia.
Jacqueline Ng-Osorio, DrPH
Dr. Jacqueline Ng-Osorio is a Faculty Specialist at the University of Hawaii at Manoa School of Nursing and Dental Hygiene. She is responsible for the assessments and evaluation for the school. She also works with graduate ‘IKE AO PONO students as an advisor, which focuses on Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander students. Prior to coming to UH Mānoa Dr. Ng-Osorio worked as a researcher at Kamehameha Schools focusing on the K-12 internal and external programs. Her research focuses on Native Hawaiian adolescents, healthy lifestyle behaviors including physical activity and eating habits, as well as the relationship between education and health outcomes. She also provides training and workshops on the qualitative methodology Photovoice.
Jennifer Burrell, PhD
Dr. Jennifer Burrell founded MadX, a research and evaluation firm in July of 2014. She earned her PhD in Developmental Psychology at Howard University. Her research interests include adolescent development, identity/culture in the classroom, and STEM education. Her research has primarily focused on empowering underrepresented groups to pursue, persist, and succeed in educational endeavors. In 2013, Dr. Burrell published her first co-authored article on Math and Science Middle School students in the journal, Culture and Psychology. She has served as interim chair of the American Education Research Association’s Talent Development Special Interest Group and on grant proposal review panels for the U.S. Department of Education, the National Science Foundation, and the DC Children and Youth Investment Trust Corporation. This year, her co-authored research article on citizen empowerment and technology was awarded the Best Paper Award (Top 1%) at the prestigious Association for Computing Machinery’s Computer Human Interaction Conference.
Karen Trujillo, PhD
Dr. Karen Trujillo has been an educator in New Mexico for over 20 years. She has served the children in New Mexico as a teacher, a principal, a grant writer and a researcher. She has been a research faculty member for the past 6 years at New Mexico State University. She is currently the director of The Alliance for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning where she is the PI and Co-PI of both federal and state grants. She also serves as the state director of Educators Rising and the STEM Outreach Alliance Research (SOAR) Lab. The SOAR Lab employs undergraduate and graduate students who work with K12 Outreach programs on research and evaluation. She is excited to be part of the LEEAD cohort so that she can learn new evaluation skills to use professionally and to pass on to the students in the SOAR Lab.
Lauren Causey, PhD
Dr. Lauren Causey is the Manager of Sponsored Research at Augsburg University (Minneapolis, MN), in the Office of Grants and Sponsored Programs. In this role, Dr. Causey provides guidance and direct support to secure funds from external agencies for faculty and student research, with an emphasis on the natural sciences. She steers federal proposals from idea generation to project closeout, is involved with broader strategic planning for research development on Augsburg’s primarily undergraduate campus, and ensures that federal regulations (especially Uniform Guidance) are being adhered to. Dr. Causey has experience as a social science researcher and program evaluator. Her work is attentive to issues concerning race-, class-, and gender-based disparities in formal and informal educational settings. Dr. Causey holds a PhD from the University of Minnesota–Twin Cities, a master’s degree from Harvard Graduate School of Education, and a bachelor’s degree from Howard University.
Moctezuma García, PhD, MSSW
Dr. Moctezuma García is Assistant Professor at Texas State University with an MSSW from Columbia University and a PhD from the City University of New York. Dr. García is also a former research fellow at Yale University’s Center for Interdisciplinary Research on AIDS. Current research endeavors have focused on mixed-methods research on access and engagement to care for HIV related services among Latino MSM in Texas and Puerto Rico. Dr. García also has international experience in monitoring and evaluation at UNICEF as well as human rights program development for local community-based organizations in Cambodia.
Ndidiamaka Amutah, PhD, MPH, CHES
Dr. Ndidiamaka Amutah-Onukagha is the President and Founder of Amaka Consulting and Evaluation Services, LLC and has over 15 years of experience conducting health disparities work, with specialties in program development, evaluation, and mixed methods research. She has consulted and worked with Federal, State, and local agencies as an evaluator and research scientist. Her contributions have included projects focused on health equity, sexual assault, strategic planning, HIV/AIDS, adolescent health, mental health services, and maternal and child health.
Her most recent research consultations have included a mixed methods analysis of a programmatic intervention aimed at improving pregnancy outcomes for underserved communities and women of color, as well as the evaluation of a state-wide maternal and child health program aimed at assessing the quality of health services delivered to women in rural communities. Her skills and focus include needs assessment, survey development, interview administration, focus group facilitation, and program implementation and evaluation.
Noé Rubén Chávez, PhD
Dr. Noé Rubén Chávez is currently an Assistant Professor at Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science, in the Community Counseling Program. He is a trained community psychologist, focused on research in health equity and cultural competency in healthcare. He earned his PhD in Community Psychology from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and completed two postdoctoral fellowships, focused on adolescent health, the first at Columbia University Medical Center and more recently at the comprehensive cancer center of City of Hope (COH). At COH he collaborated with biologists on science education for underrepresented youth of color. There he also worked with a multisectoral coalition conducting youth participatory action research (YPAR) empowering youth to improve local community health. Currently, he is working with the MLK Community Healing and Trauma Prevention Center in South Los Angeles conducting a mixed-methods evaluation of the center.
Nyron N. Crawford, PhD
Dr. Nyron N. Crawford is a Visiting Associate Research Scholar in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, and an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Temple University (on leave AY 18-20). He is also a fellow in the Faculty Leaders Program for Policy Research and Analysis at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. Dr. Crawford received his doctorate in Political Science from The Ohio State University, a BA in the same discipline from Howard University, and has certificates in survey research, social enterprise development, and non-profit management and leadership. Prior to joining Temple, he was a diversity dissertation fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Sofía Bahena, EdD
Dr. Sofía Bahena is an assistant professor of education at the University of Texas at San Antonio. Her research interests include identifying, promoting, and leveraging community-based resources – as well as sound education policy – to create pathways to (and through) higher education for under-represented populations in the United States. Dr. Bahena received her B.A. in sociology and business administration from Trinity University (San Antonio, TX) and an EdM and EdD from the Harvard Graduate School of Education (Cambridge, MA).
Tywanda McLaurin-Jones, PhD
Dr. Tywanda McLaurin-Jones is a licensed Clinical Psychologist and serves as the Director of Behavioral Sciences in Department of Community & Family Medicine at Howard University. She received her doctorate from Howard University with specialties in pediatrics and behavioral medicine. She completed her residency at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. Dr. McLaurin-Jones’ broad research interests include culturally-specific interventions to reduce risk behaviors among emerging young adults. Her current research focuses on identifying ethnic, spiritual, and family protective factors of alcohol use among minority, college women.
Wytress Richardson, EdD
Dr. Wytress Richardson is an Associate Professor in the College of Professional Studies and Advancement, School of Social and Behavioral Sciences at National Louis University and has spent the last 17 years in higher education. She is the Chair of the Applied Behavioral Science Department. Dr. Richardson’s clinical background spans 20 years of her career in the Human Services field where she has held positions as a dually certified counselor in mental health and substance abuse. Prior to joining National Louis she spent 7 years as a Program Director in the Intensive Rehabilitation Department at the Salvation Army Harbor Light Center.
Meet More LEEADers
Every Leaders in Equitable Evaluation and Diversity (LEEAD) cohort is composed of Scholars from a variety of backgrounds who represent multiple interests, each bringing unique perspectives creating a robust community. LEEADers are dedicated to moving the field of evaluation toward social justice through culturally responsive and equitable evaluation (CREE).