Meet the Team

Morgan is a Research Project Coordinator in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Morgan holds a Master of Public Health in Health and Social Behavior from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health (MPH-65 program, Class of 2022).

With a strong commitment to community health and health equity, Morgan is passionate about supporting community-based organizations (CBOs) and frontline staff who deliver essential services to their clients and broader communities. Prior to her current role, Morgan worked as a Community Health Worker at Hennepin County, where she connected children and families to preventative medical and dental care. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she contributed to Hennepin County’s emergency response, supporting adults experiencing homelessness as a Site Lead at decentralized shelter sites and later as part of their housing stability team.

Beyond her professional interests, Morgan enjoys catching up with friends and family, spending time outdoors, and participating in local community gardening and planting initiatives.

Akshay Narayanan is an MPH student at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, specializing in Health & Social Behaviour. His research focuses on population mental health, examining emotional resilience and agency among adolescents and young adults who have experienced trauma, violence, and familial separation.

He is interested in studying how evidence can help address the crisis of care by supporting organizational learning for priority-setting and innovation in community mental health interventions. His approach integrates political economy insights with public health evidence to develop more comprehensive decision-making frameworks for non-profit organizations and governments.

When he isn’t lounging under a tree, Akshay can usually be found writing or practising classical Carnatic music!

Isabella is a research assistant with the Ramanadhan Lab and a graduate student at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; She is enrolled in the Master of Public Health (MPH) program with a concentration in Health and Social Behavior. Isabella graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Public Health from the University of Michigan in 2022. 

With a deep interest in social medicine, community health, and trauma-informed care, Isabella is driven to explore the impact of structural biases, social inequalities, and racism on health equity, developing more practical ways to implement multi-level interventions that overcome these barriers. Before joining her current program, Isabella gained experience working in health equity and cancer prevention/control research at the University of Michigan and University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). 

Beyond her academic and professional endeavors, Isabella enjoys playing the piano and guitar, making jewelry and art, and spending time in the sun.

Emily Newton-Hoe (she/her) is a Population Health Sciences doctoral student in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Her research explores the social and structural determinants of reproductive and perinatal health inequities using quantitative and qualitative methods. She is particularly interested in the ways in which public policies engender inequities in the context of gender and health and how implementation science can be leveraged to advance health equity.
Before starting the PhD program, Emily worked at Mathematica conducting social policy research and evaluations in the areas of social determinants of health, reproductive and maternal health, quality measurement, and Medicaid policy. She holds an MPH from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and MPA from Clark University.
Outside of her research, Emily enjoys hiking, camping, swimming, and birding!  

Priyanka, PhD, MPH, is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the Dana–Farber/Harvard Cancer Center. Her research uses mixed methods and community-engaged approaches to develop culturally relevant strategies for improving cancer screening in medically underserved populations. She is currently learning to apply implementation science and participatory methods to enhance the delivery of evidence-based cancer prevention interventions in under-researched communities.

Jen Cruz, PhD, MPH (she/her) recently graduated with her PhD from the Population Health Sciences program with a focus on Applied Social Epidemiology. Jen is passionate about the intersection of community, public health, and justice. Prior to coming to HSPH, she received her MPH in Global Health Epidemiology from the University of Michigan and her BS in Psychology from Seattle University. She was also a Fulbright-Nehru Student Researcher. Jen is now working at the New York Academy of Medicine as the Associate Director of Non-Communicable Diseases. 

Shinelle O. Kirk is a Senior Research Associate at the Conservation Law Foundation, where she primarily works on the Healthy Neighborhoods Study, a large participatory action research study examining the impact of neighborhood changes on health. With a background in clinical care and research, she brings extensive public health expertise to her work, focusing on implementation science projects that elevate resident expertise in research and decision-making, translating findings into actionable strategies to improve health outcomes and systems.