Our Leadership Team is led by our Founding Director, Interim Dean Melody Goodman. Each leadership team member brings a wealth of experience, knowledge, and perspective to The Center for Anti-racism, Social Justice, & Public Health.
Dr. Melody S. Goodman is a biostatistician and research methodologist. Her research interest is identifying the origins of health inequities and developing, as necessary, evidence-informed primary prevention strategies to reduce these health inequities. Dr. Goodman’s research efforts seek to develop a more rigorous understanding of the social risk factors contributing to urban health inequities to develop culturally competent, region-specific solutions through collaborative activities with community members, community-based organizations, faith-based organizations, and other community health stakeholders. Her work aims to develop solutions for improving health in minoritized and medically underserved communities.
Dr. Goodman led the team that developed and comprehensively evaluated the Research Engagement Survey Tool, a quantitative survey measure to assess the level of community engagement in research studies from the community partner perspective. She is the Founding Director of the Center for Antiracism, Social Justice, & Public Health. With numerous funders supporting her work (e.g., National Institutes of Health, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Verizon Foundation, Long Island Community Foundation, Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, and Susan G. Komen), she has published over 100 peer-reviewed journal articles and two books (2018 Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group): 1) Public Health Research Methods for Partnerships and Practice and 2) Biostatistics for Clinical and Public Health Research. She is a Fellow of the American Statistical Association and the inaugural recipient of the Societal Impact Award from the Caucus for Women in Statistics (2021).
"I am excited to see CASJPH develop from an idea in my head to a real vibrant and active research center focused on community engagement, pathway programs and rigorous statistical analysis. We have established ourselves in the first few years and I am delighted to see the CASJPH leadership team expand."
Adolfo G. Cuevas is a community psychologist known for his interdisciplinary research, employing epidemiological, psychological, and biological methods to investigate the interrelationship between race, discrimination, and health inequities. His research has uncovered various biological and molecular pathways through which interpersonal and structural discrimination increase the risk of disease. He is also recognized for his contributions to investigating racial health disparities within the Latino/Hispanic population. He is currently leading two NIH-funded projects on the effects of neighborhood and interpersonal discrimination on biological dysregulation throughout the life course and spearheading working groups on racial health equity research. His work has been published in leading scientific journals such as Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Brain, Behavior, and Immunity, and the American Journal of Public Health, and featured in Forbes, US News, and NPRs Code Switch.
"I’m honored to work alongside prominent scholars at the center to advance anti-racism research and interventions. My goal is to collaborate with Dr. Goodman to achieve two overarching objectives: help our team meet immediate goals and ensure the exciting projects at the center receive the support they need. I also look forward to mentoring the next generation of scholars who will be working with us at the center.”
Stephanie H. Cook (MPI) is a NYU James Weldon Johnson Professor of Biostatistics and Social and Behavioral Sciences at the School of Global Public Health (GPH). She is also the Director of the Attachment and Health Disparities Research Lab (AHDL). Her overarching research focuses on understanding how structural- and individual-level minority stressors contribute to health across the lifespan. Her substantive methodological and statistical focus is on the development and application of intensive longitudinal study designs (e.g. ecological momentary assessment and daily diaries) for determining the ways that dynamic changes in features of minority stress are associated with changes in risk behaviors and physical health among racial/ethnic and/or sexual minority young adults. More specifically, she is currently a PI for three research projects (project 1, project 2, and project 3), two of which utilize novel methodologies (the integration of Geographically-Explicit Ecological Momentary Assessment and natural language processing) to assess the linkages between intersectional discrimination and Cardiovascular Disease Health among Sexual and Gender Minorities of color. Further, Dr. Cook is an NIH All of Us Ambassador, who is continuously committed to increasing the number of investigators who use All of Us data.
“I love seeing change in progress and thus I am extremely excited to take on this role and help increase pathways.”
Dr. Jemar Bather is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Biostatistics and the Statistical Director for the NYU Center for Anti-racism, Social Justice & Public Health at the NYU School of Global Public Health. He is a statistical epidemiologist whose research centers on novel applications of statistical methods to investigate social, structural, and environmental factors affecting health outcomes. He aims to provide empirical evidence that will inform targeted interventions, policy decision-making, and effective prevention strategies. His work is published in diverse outlets such as Environmental Research, Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes, Statistics in Medicine, Health Education & Behavior, Public Health Reports, Health & Justice, and Environmental Health Insights. Dr. Bather received his PhD and AM in Biostatistics from Harvard University, MS in Applied Statistics from NYU, and BS in Statistics from Pennsylvania State University.
"I'm excited to train graduate students in applying quantitative methods to address research questions related to the center's mission. I also look forward to showcasing the center's statistical research capacity as a resource for scientists needing statistical support and guidance for manuscript and grant development."