HEALTH POLICY RESEARCH SCHOLARS DISSERTATION GRANT AWARDEES
All scholars in Health Policy Research Scholars (HPRS) are eligible to apply for the HPRS Dissertation Grant, a competitive award of up to $10,000 dollars. The one-time grant supports scholar dissertation research activities for projects that have specific health policy implications and advance a Culture of Health. Applications are reviewed and awarded quarterly.
Who is Health Policy Research Scholars for?
Doctoral students from a variety of disciplines—such as urban planning, political science, economics, anthropology, education, social work, geography, and sociology—who are committed to using policy change to advance population health and health equity.Applicants must be:
- Full-time doctoral students who are entering the second year of their programs in fall 2022 and do not expect to graduate before spring/summer 2025.
- From historically marginalized backgrounds and/or populations underrepresented in specific doctoral disciplines.
- Pursuing a research-focused discipline that can advance a Culture of Health.
- Interested in health policy and interdisciplinary approaches.
What do scholars receive?
- Annual award funding of up to $30,000 for up to four years or until they complete their doctoral program (whichever is sooner).
- Mentoring and training in health policy and leadership.
- Professional ties to public health and policy leaders and innovators from diverse fields.
- Opportunity to compete for an additional dissertationgrant of up to $10,000.
- Membership in a network of scholars and alumni for research and advocacy collaborations.
- Hayden Dawes: Liberating Ourselves with #RadicalPermission: A Mixed-Methods Intervention Study of People in Digital Community
- Monica De La Cruz: Beyond Sticks and Stones: Exploring Discourses of Poverty
- James Huỳnh: How Kinship and Coalition Networks Shape Distress, Anxiety, and Well-Being Among People Involved in LGBTQ+ Vietnamese American Issues in Orange County, CA
- Kate Somerville: Exploring the Role of School Policy in Healing, Wellbeing, and Mental Health: Centering Student Perspectives on School-Based Approaches to Trauma
- Mi’Chael Wright: Not on [ ]’s Internet: Black Girl’s Identity and Their Dichotomous Online Experiences
- Keona Wynne: Probing Psychotraumatology Frameworks and Models: An Investigation into the Explanatory Power of Psychotraumatology for Health Equity
- Gabriella Alvarez: Neuroinflammatory Mechanisms Linking Chronic Stress to Motivational Deficits: A Neuropharmacological Approach
- Sofia Cárdenas: Fathers’ Sleep Quality, White Matter Microstructure, and Neural Activation During the Transition to Parenthood
- Daniel Do: COVID-19, Racism, and Mental Health Services
- Morgan Farnworth: Governing the Overdose Crisis: A Multilevel Analysis of Problems, Policy, and Public Capacity
- Jordyn Gunville: Maternal Health Outcomes and Access to Prenatal Care Among American Indians: A Mixed Methods Dissertation
- Alein Haro-Ramos: Immigration and Racial Hierarchies: Structural sources of mental health disparities and digital innovations for mental health among U.S. Latinxs
- Ariel Hart: Beyond the Obstetric Carceral Sphere?: Examining Midwifery Epistemology and Praxis in a Black-led Birth Center
- Gabriel Johnson: Hegemonic Masculinity in Black men ≠ Black Masculinity: An Attempt to Avert the Dominant Gaze, and Its Effects on the Mental Health of Young BlaQ Men
- Destiny Printz: Melanated and Mindful: Feasibility of a Brief Parental Stress Intervention for Black and Hispanic Mothers of Toddlers
- Mahader Tamene: Assessing the Impact of Structural Racism on the Mental Health of Birthing People
- Gabriel Lorenzo Aguilar: The Case for Humanitarian Technical Communication: Theory, Method, and Praxis
- Asia Ivey: Black Educators Matter: An Examination of Equity Leadership and Policy Implications for Critical Professional Development
- Natalie Larez: A Pilot Study: Youth Participatory Engagement and Action in Mental Health
- Deniss Martinez: Knowledge and Power Sharing in Indigenous Natural Resource Collaborations in California
- Michael Rosario: [Coming Soon]
- Shlon Smith: Access Defined: Towards a Better Understanding of Black Youth’s Access and Utilization of School Mental Health Services
- Christopher Chiu: Sexual Racism and Health among Asian American Sexual Minority Men
- Grace Ibitamuno: Investigating the Health and Wellness of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and their Families
- Mudia Uzzi: Structural Drivers of Violent Crime in Baltimore City: An Investigation of Historical and Contemporary Practices and Patterns of Structural Racism
- TyKera Marrow: Just Be A Man About It: A Sequential Explanatory Examination of Men’s Health and Healthcare Utilization
- Ezinne Nwankwo: Matters of Place and Health: Ethnic Enclaves, Immigration Enforcement, and Preterm Births Among Latina Mothers in the U.S.
- Samantha Perez: A Novel Cancer-Specific Plectin Targeting Monoclonal Antibody Promotes an Antitumor Immune Response in PDAC Models
- Noah Triplett: Applying Human-Centered Design to Maximize Acceptability, Feasibility, and Usability of Mobile Technology Supervision in Kenya: A Mixed Methods Pilot Study
- Natasha Wiliams: Mental Health Among Black Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual People: Examining Patterns of Risk, Treatment Utilization, and Mental Health Management Strategies
- Chioma Woko: The Effect of Source Credibility on Promising Message Themes: A Message Pretesting Study to Address COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy among Black Americans
- Shanaé Burch: In Pursuit of Healthful Narratives: Black Women and/or Gender-Expansive Citizens Creating and Performing Art and Cultural Work in Service of “Good Health”
- Alberto Cifuentes: A Convergent Mixed Methods Study of the Impact of Stigma on the Sexual Health and Substance Use Outcomes of Internet-based Cisgender Male Sex Workers Who Have Sex with Men
- Katherine Gutierrez: Three Essays on Policy, Equity, and Economics
- Ans Irfan: Advancing Culture of Health & Health Systems Strengthening through Climate Adaptive Social Entrepreneurship: Social Impact Case Study for Climate Competent Care
- Jocelyn Poe: On Trauma Imaginaries & Community Health
- Jake Ryann Sumibcay: Examining Structural Racism as a Fundamental Cause of Health Inequities Among the Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders in the United States and the Indigenous Māori and Pacific Peoples in Aotearoa New Zealand: An Exploratory Comparative Case Study Analysis
- Tiana Moore: Residential Mobility and Historical Discriminatory Housing Policy’s Influence on Contemporary Child Health and Cognition
- Hawi Teizazu: Maternal Mortality in the Spotlight: An Analysis of Maternal Health Research, News Media Coverage, and Public Opinion Related to Maternal Mortality and Maternal Health Policies in the United States
- Matthew Bakko: Disentangling Punishment and Care: Organizing Institutional Change in Municipal Community Safety
- Andrew Arriaga: It’s the Law?: A Study of Policy, Minority Stress, and Gay Men’s Barriers to Parenthood in the United States
- Mónica Gutierrez: Does Power Impact an Individual’s Ability to Maintain Place, Space, and Identity? A Community Study
- M. Nicole Kunkel: The Effects of Perinatal PCBs and Sociosexual Stress on the Hypothalamus and Behavior of Female Rats
- Kevin Wiley Jr.: Data Quality and Care Coordination in Type 2 Diabetes Management
- Angela Adler: Brain Injury and Romantic Partnership: Relationship Quality and Stigma
- Deanna Barath: Hospital Cross-Sector Partnerships to Improve Health Outcomes
- Rebekah Cross: Gentrification, Residential Mobility and Preterm Birth among Black Women: A Mixed-Methods Study of Racial Resegregation in Northern California
- Yaminette Diaz-Linhart: Does Worker Voice Impact Worker Well-being in Health Care and Social Services?
- Tran Doan: A Cost-Effectiveness Analysis of Universal Routine Depression Screening of U.S. Adolescents in Primary Care
- Josefina Flores Morales: Three Essays on the Health of Immigrants and Undocumented Adults and Elders
- Terrell Frazier: Innovation at the Intersection: Specifying the Dynamics of Tactical Innovation within Heterogenous Activist Networks
- Regina Fuller: The (Un)Making of Comprehensive Sexuality Education Policy in Ghana
- Cristina Gomez-Vidal: The Legal Reproduction of Maternal and Infant Health Inequities in Unincorporated Communities
- Ashley Gripper: We Don’t Farm because it’s Trendy: An Environmental Justice Approach to Understanding the Connections Between Urban Agriculture and Health in Philadelphia
- Raven Hardy: Mechanism of Brain Circuitry Underlying Cognitive Decline in Sickle Cell Disease (SCD)
- Demar Lewis: Black Ideologies on Community Safety in the 21st Century
- Kathleen McCarty: Sport Opportunities for Collegiate Students with Disabilities: A Mixed Methods Review of Current Program Offerings, Barriers, and Facilitators
- Laurent Reyes: A Phenomenological Study Exploring Experiences of Civic Participation among Older African Americans and Latinx Immigrants using an Intersectional Life-Course Perspective
- Kristi Roybal: Exploring the Relationship between Historical Redlining and Place-Based Reproductive Health Inequities: A Qualitative GIS Approach
- Leslie Salas-Hernández: Understanding Police-Public Contact: The Role of Police Violence and a Police Training Intervention
- Samantha Scott: How Deep is your Kaumaha? Unfolding the Experiences of Historical and Intergenerational Trauma among Wāhine
- Dislorei (Desi) Small-Rodriguez: Remaking Collective Identities: Data Sovereignty, Citizenship, and Indigenous Nations
- Jennifer Whittaker: Understanding the Role of Place in Health and Wellbeing for Rural Families: A Photovoice Project by Moms
- Bukola Bakare: Corporate Social Responsibility and Traffic Congestion: A Mixed Methods Study
- Samuel Baxter: Examining Racial Differences in Cardiovascular Health among Young Men: The role of Residential Segregation
- Jasmine Blanks Jones: Performance as Public Work: Youth as Civic Actors for Policy and Practice in Liberia
- Erica Browne: Moving Further Upstream to Promote Racial Equity: A Mixed Method Analysis of Private Nonprofit Hospital Community Benefit
- Brittney Butler: Examination of Exposures to Anti-Black Racism Over the Lifecourse and their Association with Pregnancy Induced Hypertensive Disorders Among Black Women
- Alane Celeste-Villalvir: Finding the Missing Millions: An Exploration of Challenges and Facilitators to Hepatitis C (HCV) Screening Among Individuals Experiencing Homelessness
- Angeliz Encarnación Burgos: Urban Development under Conditions of Colonialism: A Critical Urban History of Santurce, Puerto Rico
- Mario Alberto Espinoza-Kulick: La Gente Unida: Latinx Immigrant and Indigenous Health and Advocacy on California’s Central Coast
- Jenny Guadamuz: Immigration Status, Cardiovascular Risk Factors, and Medication Use in the United States
- Ana Herrera: The Association between Tobacco Retail Outlet Density and Advertising with Neighborhood Socio-demographic Characteristics around Colleges in Texas
- Amy Jones: The New Affirmative Action: The Experience of Students of Color in Diversity-Focused Collegiate Incorporation Programs
- Matthew Lee: Advancing Understandings of Policy Implementation and Sustainability to Address Health Equity: A Mixed Methods Case Study of Tobacco Control in New York City
- Jennifer McGee-Avila: Multilevel Points of Intervention to Improve Cervical Cancer Screening Among Women Living with HIV: A Mixed Methods Approach to Addressing Health Inequities
- Marcela Nava: The Political Economy of Immigrant Health: An Interdisciplinary Exploration of Social Capital and the Immigrant Paradox
- Adrian Neely: School Connectedness and African American Students: An Examination with Implications for Policy and Teacher Education
- Marie Plaisime: Perceptions of Racial Bias & Interracial Anxiety Among Medical Students: A Mixed Methods Study
- Arrianna Planey: A Multi-Scale Spatial & Political Economic Analysis of Health Policy, Provider Location Decisions, and Access to Audiology Services
- Jennifer Richmond: Reducing Racial Disparities in Health Services Use: Exploring the Role of Racial Equity Training for Nurse Navigators and Improved Measurement of Trust in Health Care
- Kristefer Stojanovski: Systems Science Approaches to Visualize, Model, and Explore Stigma’s Role in Socially Patterning HIV Risk Among Gay, Bisexual, and Other Men Who Have Sex With Men (GBMSM) in Europe
- Dana Williamson: Understanding Capacity-building Efforts to Address Environmental Justice Concerns
- Henry Willis: Developing a Culturally-Adapted Mobile Mental Health Intervention: A Multi-Study, Mixed Methods Approach
- Andrew Anderson: Exploring Mental Health Disparities among Accountable Care Organizations
- Sondra Calhoun Lavigne: Antimicrobial Use and Resistance: Intersections of Companion Animal and Public Health
- Michelle Doose: Examining the Multilevel Influences on Diabetes and Hypertension Clinical Care Management among Breast Cancer Patients
- Paul Shafer: Effect of the Affordable Care Act on Utilization of Emergency and Primary Care
- Patrice Williams: “They Over-Promised and Under-Delivered”: A Mixed Methods Study on the Effects of Residential Displacement Pressure on Black Residents in Southwest Atlanta