Past Cohorts

Tyrone J. Bethune is currently a doctoral student at Georgia Southern University in the Jiann-Ping Hsu College of Public Health within the department of Health Policy and Community Health. He received a Master of Public Health in Health Policy and Management from Texas A&M University Health Science Center. He completed his undergraduate studies at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University where he received his bachelor's degree.

Latesha K. Harris graduated from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) School of Nursing with Highest Honors and University Distinction in December 2020. Latesha is a second-year Ph.D. student, a UNC Hillman Scholar in Nursing Innovation (BSN-PhD), and a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy Research Scholar. Latesha completed her Hillman Clinical Fellowship at UNC Hospitals in an Acute and Intermediate Coronary Care Unit and continues to work clinically as a registered nurse.

(she/her/hers) is a current doctoral student of Sociology at Indiana University, Bloomington. As a graduate student, her research focuses on the structural and social determinants of health inequalities through intersectional and critical race praxes. In particular, she is interested in examining the health and well-being of underrepresented racial minorities (URMs) at the intersections of race, gender, and class, as well as how URMs engage in help-seeking behaviors while in white institutions and perceive the utility and quality of healthcare services.

Emilie Kadhim is an interdisciplinary research scientist and artist. Her interests focus on identifying and understanding the impact of social and environmental factors on health outcomes, especially around the social determinants of health. Other areas of interest include patient-centered care, health services research, and racial health disparities.

(she/her/hers) Bee’s parents immigrated to the United States in the early 1970's from Mexico. She was born and raised in California and identifies as a Mexican- American, cisgender, heterosexual female. She is married and has two dogs. In her free time, she enjoys nature, biking, reading, and photography. Bee is a doctoral student at the University of Central Florida, where she studies Medical Sociology. Bee completed her undergraduate education at California State University Northridge, where she attained baccalaureate degrees in psychology and child development and a minor in human sexuality. Her master’s degree was completed at the University of Cincinnati in experimental psychology in the research methods and statistics. Bee is committed to building community while conducting research that can be shared with the public to improve people's living conditions. This commitment guides her scholarly activities. Bee identifies as a transdisciplinary researcher in health equity. She thinks that recognizing who we are and how we got here (and there) helps us understand and shape our work. Her current research focuses on health, health access, and social inequalities in health and the medical profession. Specifically, she uses an intersectional lens to assess the impact of isms (e.g., racism, heterosexism) and the social construction of gender and sexual orientation on health, health outcomes, and the way we practice medicine in the U.S. healthcare system.

Elle Strand graduated from Duke University with a BS in Biology and a BA in Global Health. Over her undergraduate career, Elle spearheaded research on the quality of and access to leprosy care options in Sri Lanka; emergency care for scarf-related injuries in Bangladesh; and the dynamics and drivers of domestic minor sex trafficking in the United States. Her senior capstone with the Duke Global Health Institute investigated the socioeconomic impacts of COVID-19 in Durham, NC.