About Me
Throughout my career, I have sought to improve healthcare access for marginalized communities worldwide — especially for LGBTQ+ folks and people with HIV. This interest was sparked while serving at STAR TRACK as an HIV counselor for LGBTQ+ youth and working abroad on poverty reduction projects with MIT’s D-Lab. These experiences highlighted a myriad of unconscionable barriers to care, which drove me to train as a researcher to help address the issue. I have had the privilege of working in Peru, Ecuador, Chile, India, and South Africa.
My academic training spans environmental engineering, international health, and infectious disease epidemiology at institutions like MIT, Northwestern University, and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Since then, I have transitioned into consulting for the SMART4TB initiative in partnership with the Johns Hopkins Center for Tuberculosis Research and USAID.
Outside of research, I like to donate my time to youth organizations such as the Maryland Science Olympiad and capacity-building cooperatives like Velocipede, a community-run bicycle shop.
I am also deeply committed to promoting inclusion, diversity, equity, and anti-racism (DEI) in academia. While at Hopkins, I worked on a number of initiatives — including leading the development of a departmental strategic plan for DEI. I also conducted workshops to prepare students and faculty to address micro-aggressions and mental health crises. I co-first authored an article on these topics, which was published in the American Journal of Epidemiology and received the Editor’s Choice.
In my free time, I enjoy soaking up the beautiful outdoors, taking multi-day bicycle tours, playing with my pug Uda, knitting, and doing lots of crafts.