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Who We Are |
Volunteer
Who We Are
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Faculty
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Alwyn Cohall, MD, Principal Investigator and Project Director, is beginning his third decade of service as a physician to the residents of Northern Manhattan, and has served as the HHPC Principal Investigator for five years. He is an Associate Professor of Clinical Public Health and Clinical Pediatrics at MSPH and the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons (CPS). He received the 2001 Public Health Achievement Award from NYC DHMH, the 2003 Leadership Award from the New York Civil Liberties Union Reproductive Rights Project, and the 2006 Shirley Gordon Public Policy Leadership Award from Family Planning Advocates. He has authored or co-authored more than 40 publications on a wide-range of health issues as they affect children, adolescents, and adults in Northern Manhattan. Dr. Cohall received his medical training at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, underwent his Pediatric Residency at Montefiore Hospital, and completed his Adolescent Medicine Fellowship at Mt. Sinai Hospital.
atc1@columbia.edu |
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Rita Kukafka, DrPH, Co-PI, is an MSPH Assistant Professor and Coordinator of the Public Health Informatics
Specialization in the CPS Dept. of Biomedical Informatics. She has conducted
research at MSPH for ten years in school health, web applications for cardiovascular
disease and patient education, and integrating informatics competencies
into Nurse Practitioner training curricula. Dr. Kukafka holds a Doctorate
degree from the School of Public Health at Columbia University, and two
Masters degrees; one in community health education from New York University,
and the second in Medical Informatics from Columbia University, where she
also completed a 3-year National Library of Medicine funded Fellowship
in Medical Informatics.
rik7001@dbmi.columbia.edu |
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Joyce Moon-Howard, DrPH, Co-Investigator, is an MSPH Assistant Professor and has conducted research at MSPH for 16 years in substance abuse, HIV/AIDS, cardiovascular disease, and child and adolescent development. She is currently the PI of a four-year CDC-SIPS research project on tobacco use in Harlem. Dr. Moon-Howard received her undergraduate degree in social psychology from the University of California at Berkeley and her graduate degrees in Sociomedical Sciences from the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University.
jmh7@columbia.edu |
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Mary E. Northridge, PhD, MPH, Co-Investigator, has been associated with the HHPC since 1993. She earned an MPH in environmental health and a PhD in epidemiology.
Currently, she works collaboratively with New York City agencies and CBOs
on public health issues related to social and environmental justice and urban planning. She is an Associate Professor of Clinical Sociomedical Sciences at the MSPH, Director of Epidemiology at the HHPC, and Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of Public Health. Dr. Northridge has authored or co-authored more than 90 publications in areas including environmental health, injury, asthma, oral health, tobacco, depression, and cardiovascular health. She is also a co-principal investigator of the Harlem Children’s Zone Asthma Initiative, which is led by Harlem Hospital Center and Harlem Children’s Zone, Inc. Dr. Northridge will assist with overall project design, dissemination, and translation of research into practice.
men11@columbia.edu |
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Roger D. Vaughan, DrPH, Evaluation Director, is an MSPH Associate Professor of Clinical Public Health and Biostatistics. He has conducted research at MSPH for 12 years, and currently serves as Co-PI on a three-year HHS research project, "Understanding Access Barriers to Care Among Underserved Populations." He is Associate Editor of Statistics and Evaluation for the American Journal of Public Health; and has co-authored nearly fifty research articles. Dr. Vaughan received his Doctorate degree in Biostatistics from Columbia University.
rdv2@columbia.edu |
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Kavita P. Ahluwalia, DDS, is an Assistant
professor of Clinical Dentistry at Columbia University’s School of
Dental and Oral Surgery. Dr. Ahluwalia earned both her DDS and MPH from
the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and completed a residency in Dental
Public Health at the Veterans Administration in Perry Point, MD. Dr. Ahluwalia
currently works on a project funded by the American Legacy and W.K. Kellogg
Foundations to implement tobacco control measures in eleven communities
across the nation, and has served on a project funded by the RWJ Foundation’s
Addressing Tobacco in Managed Care Initiative. In addition to assessing
the oral cancer prevention curriculae of US Medical Schools, Dr. Ahluwalia
has studied barriers to care and oral cancer practices and opinions of older
adults in Central Harlem. She is Principal Investigator on a study designed
to assess the utility of training home care workers to provide oral health
services to homebound elderly in Northern Manhattan, and another study to
determine the relationship between oral health status and functional status
in homebound seniors. Both these studies are funded by the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention.
kpa8@columbia.edu |
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Staff
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Renee Cohall, ACSW, Coordinator of Quality Assurance, identifies, trains, and supervises students participating in HHPC research. She previously served for seven years as the Senior Social Worker at the St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Adolescent HIV/AIDS Clinic. She has co-authored articles on emergency contraception, treating teen rape victims, and dating violence. Ms. Cohall received her ACSW degree from the Hunter College School of Social Work.
rmc49@columbia.edu |
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Aanie Christopher, LMSW, Project STAY Social Worker, received her BA from the University of California at Santa Cruz and her MSW in Social Work from the Hunter College School of Social Work. She has experience working with GLBTQ youth, homeless and street-involved individuals, adolescents in out-of-home placement, people who have experienced domestic violence and adults with developmental disabilities. Ms. Christopher also has a background in social work with groups and believes strongly in the power of young people learning from and helping each other. Her practice with individuals and families is guided by a strengths-based empowerment philosophy. Ms. Christopher enjoys working with adolescents because each young person that she has met has a different story to tell and a different path in front of them.
alc9085@nyp.org |
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Mike Hernandez, BA, Community Outreach Manager, Healthy Monday Campaign. This ground-breaking national program uses message prompts at the beginning of each work week to encourage consumers to adopt health-promoting behaviors to make a “fresh start” each week through lifestyle changes such as diet and exercise. HHPC, in collaboration with Mike, will play a lead role in introducing the Healthy Monday Campaign to both the Columbia and Northern Manhattan communities. Mike has more than 20 years of experience in client relations and community service—he plays a key role in continuing to build HHPC’s community partnerships having developed key alliances with HHPC collaborators over the past several years including the YMCA, the Harlem Food and Fitness Consortium, CLIMB and the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
Mh2625@columbia.edu |
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Carly Hutchinson, MA, MPhil, Director of Communications and Community Relations, oversees center communications. In addition to coordinating newsletters and other communications vehicles that keep both the Harlem community and academic partners apprised of HHPC’s programs and efforts, she is responsible for the ongoing development of HHPC’s community-based health website, GetHealthyHarlem.org. Carly received her MA in Anthropology and Education from Teachers College, Columbia University, and is a PhD candidate in Anthropology at Columbia University. Her area of focus is food justice movements in NYC where low-income, marginalized communities are fighting for access to healthy, affordable food as a basic human right.
clh47@columbia.edu |
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Christel Hyden, MS, CHES, Jr. Programmer, is a doctoral candidate in health education at Teachers College, Columbia University who provides research and dissemination support for a variety of projects at HHPC. Ms. Hyden is also Project Director for a child feeding study at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and is an adjunct lecturer at Hunter College. She received her MS in social research from Hunter College and a BA in sociology from Wagner College.
cjh2129@columbia.edu |
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Narine Malcolm, M.Ed., Administrator and Community Liaison, for HHPC and Project STAY, is responsible for all grant submissions; the daily fiscal monitoring, reconciliation and annual reporting of all center projects and grants. She also handles communication between the center and the various fiscal and grants departments of the university. Ms. Malcolm is also the Community Liaison for HHPC’s Community Advisory Board. Ms. Malcolm holds a Masters in Counseling Psychology from Howard University.
nm247@columbia.edu |
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John A. Nelson, CPNP, PhD, Project STAY Nurse Practitioner, is responsible for providing clinical care to HIV+ and HIV at-risk adolescents and young adults, community-based outreach, research, and program growth and development. John has published journal articles on issues including LGBT adolescents, HIV and adolescents, and cervical dysplasia in adolescent women. John earned his BA at Washington University and an MS in Nursing from Yale University. He completed a post-graduate nurse practitioner certification from Columbia University School of Nursing and has a PhD in Nursing from New York University.
jon9018@nyp.org
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Andrea Nye, MPH, MBA Director of Programs and Evaluation. Andrea works across HHPC’s programs to to build evaluation capacity and provide oversight and supervision around strategic planning and evaluation design, including implementing, monitoring and evaluating program activities. Originally from Seattle, Washington, Ms. Nye received an MPH from the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University and and an MBA from Columbia Business School.
amn49@columbia.edu |
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Joanna Pudil, MA, LCSW, Project STAY Program Coordinator/Senior Social Worker, provides individual, group, couples and family therapy to sexually high risk and HIV+ adolescents. Joanna coordinates the medical and mental health care at Project STAY. She received an MA in psychology from CUNY City College and an LCSW in social work from Hunter College School of Social Work.
jop9026@nyp.org |
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Nydia Rodriguez, Administrative Assistant, provides administrative and logistical support for all HHPC projects including the organization and planning of community activities. She is involved in the preparation of grants, reports and publications as well as assisting the Community Liaison with the HHPC Community Advisory Board. She has more than 10 years experience working at Columbia University in various capacities.
nr9@columbia.edu |
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Michelle Smith, MPH, Project Coordinator, is responsible for coordinating research data for the evaluation of HHPC’s Harlem-focused health website, GetHealthyHarlem.org. She also contributes various articles about health and wellness to the site. Ms. Smith received her MPH in Health Promotion from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health and completed her BA in International Relations from Brown University.
mes2163@columbia.edu |
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Susan Vacca, MSN, CPNP, Project STAY Nurse Practitioner. Susan’s role with Project STAY is primarily with the Mobile Health Team and includes clinical care to adolescents and young adults, STI/HIV education, counseling and testing to youth through community outreach, treatment and risk reduction to STI positive youth, and connecting youth to health care. She has over 13 years experience as a nurse practitioner caring for HIV infected children and adolescents, children and adolescents exposed to HIV, and providing HIV post exposure prophylaxis for victims of sexual assault. Susan is on faculty at the New York University College of Nursing where she teaches a pediatric course in the undergraduate Nursing Program. She earned her MS in Nursing at Seton Hall University.
heffern@nyp.org |
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Yuan (Vivian) Zhang, M.S., Data Manager, is responsible for maintaining HHPC databases and analyzing data for a variety of on-going research projects. Vivian previously worked on a research project at the New York Psychiatric Institute focusing on children at risk for depression, where she developed a dynamic data sharing website (http://nyspi-hrs.cumc.columbia.edu/cgeu/home.php?id=1) for the project. She received her MS in Applied Statistics from Columbia University.
yz2212@columbia.edu |
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Part-Time Staff
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Kirby Bumpus, BA, Mobile Health Team Educator and Media Researcher, is responsible for recruiting teens and young adults for focus groups as a component of her program evaluation for HHPC’s new digital media initiative and also works with the Mobile Health Team to provide sexual and reproductive health education and screening services to New York City youth. She has experience with HIV counseling and sexual health education and is interested in HIV issues domestically as well as the use of health marketing and media in public health. Currently, she is pursuing her MPH degree in Health Promotion at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. She received her BA in Psychology and Human Biology from Stanford University.
Klb2137@columbia.edu
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Vivian Cortes, BA, Mobile Health Team Educator,focuses her work on Latino communities through a variety of organizations including Aspira of NY, Inc. and Latinas Promoviendo Comunidad/ Lambda Pi Chi Sorority, Inc. For the past four years, she has worked as a Family Planning Health Educator for Community Healthcare Network where she worked on the development of a sex-positive curriculum, facilitated workshops at schools and community based organizations throughout NYC, and counseled patients around sexual health. Vivian currently sits on the Speakers Bureau for Love Heals: The Alison Gertz Foundation for AIDS Education. In summer 2008, she facilitated the Love Heals Leadership, Empowerment and Awareness Program (LEAP) for Girls at Mixteca Organization, Inc. In the future, Vivian would like to strengthen and continue her efforts in the field of sexual and reproductive health with a focus on Latinos. She would like to bring effective programming to Latin American counrties to address STD and HIV disparities. She received her BA in Pre-Medicine with concentrations in Psychology and Latino Studies from Columbia University in 2001.
vivian.cortes@gmail.com
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Melanie Caban, AA, AIDS Institute Reporting System Data Coordinator, is responsible for entering confidential client information for Project STAY and the Mobile Health Team. Additionally, Melanie is currently training to become an HIV counselor within the Project STAY team. She is looking forward to going back to college in the Spring of 2010 to pursue a career in the field of sociology and health, in order to better serve the community.
cm2742@columbia.edu
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Julen Harris, BA, Mobile Health Team Health Educator, is currently pursuing her MPH degree at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health in Health Promotion. She previously worked for HealthCorps® as an educator, mentor and activist at a South Bronx high school, focusing on nutrition, fitness, mental resilience, and sexual health. She is very excited to continue her work with adolescents in a new capacity, and is looking forward to applying her academic development to her work with the Mobile Health Team. Julen earned her BA in Community Health from Brown University.
jh2927@columbia.edu
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Colleen Kapsimalis, BA, GetHealthyHarlem.org Content Writer and Researcher, is responsible for recruiting participants for a website pilot study at the Harlem YMCA, writing content for the GetHealthyHarlem.org website, serving on a social marketing team, and working on evaluation tasks. Currently, she is pursuing her MPH degree in Health Promotion at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, and received her BA in psychology and sociology from Stonehill College in Massachusetts.
cck2117@columbia.edu
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Maria Papadimitriou, MSc., Mobile Health Team Health Educator, is currently pursuing her MPH degree at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health in Sexuality and Health. She has extensive experience in sexual health promotion and education with youth and adults, as well as sexual health and sexuality counseling. Maria’s research interests include the improvement of access to relevant primary health care for sexually diverse minority youth.
map2177@columbia.edu
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Anna Tarleton Potter, BA, Mobile Health Team Project Coordinator, is an MPH candidate in the Heilbrunn Department of Population and Family Health at Columbia University. She has worked for several years as an HIV test counselor in urban and rural settings, and has done work with reproductive health in New York, North Carolina, and Ghana. Having received her BA in Anthropology from the University of North Carolina, she is attuned to the cultural intricacies that accompany health promotion and discussing topics of sexuality and health. Her interests include HIV prevention and positive living education, women’s sexuality and reproductive health, birth control, and community organizing.
atp2115@columbia.edu
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Laura Shulman, BA, GetHealthyHarlem.org Content Writer and Researcher, is a currently pursuing her MPH degree at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health in Health Promotion. She has extensive experience working with sexual health prevention and education across the country, as well as many years of counseling experience on a crisis hotline. Having received a BA in psychology from the University at Albany, Laura is particularly interested in people’s psychological motivators that aid or inhibit health behavior change. She is now working with HHPC on its Digital Partnerships for Health project, GetHealthyHarlem.org, developing content and recruiting community members for their participation in a pilot study regarding their health and health information seeking behaviors.
ls2732@columbia.edu
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Dana Smiles, BS, Mobile Health Team Health Educator, is currently pursuing an MPH degree at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health with a concentration in Health Promotion. Having received her BS in the department of Medicine, Health, and Society at Vanderbilt University, Dana is involved in the development of multilevel, theory-based interventions specifically related to maternal and child care, adolescent development, reproductive justice, and sexual health. In conjunction with Project STAY, Dana provides training workshops for adolescents and young adults with or at risk for HIV/AIDS in alternative high schools as well as community-based organizations.
dms2198@columbia.edu
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Winton Wedderburn, BS, GetHealthyHarlem.org Content Coordinator, is an MPH candidate at Hunter College /CUNY University, pursuing a career in Public Health Informatics. His interest is in the use of the Internet and new media for public health advocacy, education and promotion. He is a research assistant in the Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery Service at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center where he assists in the development of patient reported outcome measures for post mastectomy reconstruction. After completing his masters degree, he plans to develop his skills as a web designer and application developer to further his research on online social networking and its potential for health behavior change.
ww2245@columbia.edu
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Interns
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Elana Levites Agababa, BA, is doing a two-month internship at HHPC with Dr. Alwyn Cohall serving as her preceptor. Her goal is to gain clinical and research exposure to adolescent HIV issues in NYC. Her primary medical experience has been with AVODAH: The Jewish Service Corps where she worked as a health care advocate for the Medicare Rights Center for a year and half before starting medical school in 2005. She is a fourth-year medical student at the Medical School for International Health of Ben Gurion University in collaboration with Columbia University in Beer Sheva, Israel. She is preparing for a career in primary care, specializing in vulnerable urban populations. Elana is a graduate of Barnard College with a degree in art history and visual arts.
agababaganoush@gmail.com
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Colleen Kapsimalis, BA is serving her MPH practicum with HHPC’s Digital Partnerships for Health working on all aspects of website development for the GetHealthyHarlem.org website. Her responsibilities include recruiting participants for several focus groups as part of a community-based participatory research effort to gather community input regarding social marketing for the website as well as participating in broader social marketing and evaluation efforts. Colleen is pursuing her MPH degree in Health Promotion at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, and received her BA in psychology and sociology from Stonehill College in Massachusetts.
Cck2177@columbia.edu
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Bari Weinberg, BA, Project STAY Social Work Intern and Mobile Health Team Educator, is in the process of completing her MSW at Hunter College School of Social Work. Bari's role with Project STAY includes co-facilitating a Games Group for younger patients in addition to taking on the leadership responsibilities for the clinic's Friday Support Group. She will also join
the Mobile Health Team in their outreach to HIV+ and HIV at-risk adolescents. Her previous experiences range from providing individual and group counseling to adolescents in a high school setting, working as a hotline counselor for the Women's Rape Crisis Center of Burlington, VT, as well as completing a summer internship on the Mentally Ill Chemical Abusers (MICA) unit at Manhattan Psychiatric Center. Bari earned her BA in psychology from the University of Vermont.
bweinber@hunter.cuny.edu
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