2024 - 2025 Public Voices Fellowship Cohort
Our ‘24-‘25 Public Voices Fellowship cohort includes 20 scholars from across the university.
Dr. Doreen Agboh
Dr. Doreen Agboh is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Yale National Clinician Scholar Program. She graduated from Columbia University in the City of New York in 2014 with a major in
Neuroscience and Behavior. After completing her undergraduate studies, she conducted translational laboratory research at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania for two years before beginning medical school in 2016. She graduated from Rutgers New Jersey Medical School in 2020 with a Distinction in Urban Health. Doreen completed her residency in Emergency Medicine at the University of Chicago Medical Center in 2023, serving as Chief Resident in her final year.
Throughout her professional career, she has been highly involved in community engagement and health services research. Her professional interests lie in investigating the health disparities and social barriers that lead to poor health outcomes for marginalized communities in the urban Emergency Department setting, exploring ways to improve access to care for the minoritized communities, health equity via health policy, and serving as an advocate for the underserved.
Azmi A Ahmad
Azmi A Ahmad, PhD, is a postdoctoral associate at the Yale School of Medicine – Internal Medicine, working in the Cardiovascular Molecular Imaging Laboratory. His current research focuses on translational research using molecular imaging to develop in vivo approaches to characterize cardiovascular diseases and assess novel therapies. Dr. Ahmad has established leadership experience in the postdoctoral community as Coordinator of the Advocacy and Belonging Committees at the Yale Postdoctoral Association (YPA), as well as Outreach Chair and Co-Chair at the Yale Black Postdoctoral Association (YBPA). He additionally serves on the National Postdoctoral Association’s (NPA) Postdoc Council and as Vice-Chair of the NPA’s Advocacy Committee, leading the public policy section. Dr. Ahmad received his B.Sc. and Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from Union College and the University of Utah, respectively.
Neta Alexander
Neta Alexander is an Assistant Professor of Film and Media at Yale University. Before coming to Yale, she taught at Colgate University and served as an Assistant Editor of Journal of Cinemaand Media Studies (JCMS). She earned a PhD from New York University and a MA from Columbia University. Her work focuses on digital culture, film and media, science and technology studies, and critical disability studies. Her first book, Failure (Polity, 2020), co-authored with Arjun Appadurai, reveals how Silicon Valley and Wall Street monetize failure and forgetfulness. Her second book, Interface Frictions (forthcoming, Duke University Press), explores four ubiquitous interface design features—refresh, playback speed, autoplay, and Night Shift—to develop a theory of digital debility.
Prof. Alexander’s articles appeared in the Journal of Visual Culture, Cinema Journal, Cinergie, Film Quarterly, Media Fields Journal, and Flow Journal, among other publications. She also contributed chapters to the anthologies The Netflix Effect (Bloomsbury, 2016), Compact Cinematics (Bloomsbury, 2017), Pandemic Media (Mason Press, 2021), Technics (University of Amsterdam, 2024) and Disability Media Studies (NYU Press, forthcoming). Her public scholarship, encompassing topics such as the Internet of Medical Things, predictive personalization, and the limitations of technology, has been published in the Atlantic, Public Books, Real Life Magazine, The Brooklyn Rail, and Haaretz. Her writing has been translated into German, Slovenian, French, Italian, and Portuguese.
Cristiana Baloescu
Cristiana Baloescu, MD, MPH, is an Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine at Yale School of Medicine. She specializes in point-of-care ultrasound, an innovative technology used to enhance patient care by allowing immediate imaging at the bedside. Her academic work integrates machine learning to improve cardiac and lung ultrasound techniques, as well as the detection of high blood pressure through heart imaging.
Dr. Baloescu completed her undergraduate studies at Wesleyan College, earned her MD from the Geisel School of Medicine, and received her MPH from Yale School of Public Health. She completed her residency in Emergency Medicine at Yale New Haven Hospital.
As an advocate for global health, Dr. Baloescu chaired the Ultrasound in Global Health Community of Practice within the American Institute of Ultrasound in Medicine. She has contributed to educational resources such as teaching apps and textbooks. Her teaching extends internationally, having lectured and organized courses in countries such as Romania, Croatia, Kenya, Egypt, and the United States.
Dr. Baloescu’s research has been featured in many scientific publications, and she actively participates in professional societies like the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine. Her commitment to education and innovation is driven by a desire to improve healthcare delivery through technology. She is originally from Bucharest, Romania, and her diverse background fuels her passion for advancing medical education and practice. She aspires to shape the future of medical diagnostics and treatment through emergency ultrasound.
Shacelles Bonner is a recent graduate of the Yale Simulation Fellowship through the Department of Emergency Medicine. She currently serves as the NYU Langone-Brooklyn Simulation Site Director and a Clinical Educator at NYU Grossman School of Medicine. A mother of one, and the oldest of her parents, her life experiences color how she sees the world and how she chooses to practice medicine — as though she was caring for her family. She is a Jamaican immigrant and a first generation college graduate. As a Public Voices Fellow, Shacelles looks forward to amplifying diverse perspectives and contributing to vital public conversations. She hopes to foster informed dialogue and make a positive impact both locally and globally.Ana Maria Durán Calisto
Ana Maria Durán Calisto is a designer, planner and scholar from Quito, Ecuador. In 2002, she co-founded Estudio A0 with her husband, British-Punjabi architect Jaskran Kalirai. Estudio A0 has designed a diverse array of multi-scalar projects in close collaboration with its clients and community partners. Estudio A0’s projects have been extensively published and their work has been featured in the 18th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale “The Laboratory of the Future” (2023), and recently received a grant from the Graham Foundation to be iterated in NY. Durán Calisto is a visiting associate professor at the Yale School of Architecture, and has taught at PUCE, Harvard University’s GSD, Pratt Institute’s School of Architecture, Columbia University’s GSAPP, the University of Michigan Taubman College, the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia, the Architecture School of Universidad Católica de Temuco, and UCLA’s Institute for the Environment and Sustainability.
In 2022, Durán Calisto received the Mark Cousins Theory Award for her work on extractivism and the built environment, and her interest in the principles of ancestral urban ecologies. She has co-edited the books Ecological Urbanism in Latin America (2019), Beyond Petropolis: Designing a Practical Utopia in Nueva Loja (2015), and IV Taller Internacional de Vivienda Popular (2007). She co-authored the Charter Toward re-entanglement: A Charter for the City and the Earth (Bauhaus Earth, 2022). Durán Calisto has lectured extensively and actively publishes in magazines such as Domus, Log, Mold, The Architectural Review, Harvard Design Magazine, Casabella, Arquine, Pangea, Manifest, Rivista Territorio, Ness, Revista Cardinalis, Rita, LatinArt Magazine, Revista 30-60, Revista Plot, Revista Radar, Trama, GAM, Aula, and Deco Journal. In 2010-2011, Durán Calisto received a Loeb Fellowship for her proposal to weave a South American network devoted to critically and creatively addressing the infrastructural integration of South America. She is a member of the Science Panel for the Amazon, convened by SDSN & the UN. She co-authored its report´s chapter on urbanization.
In 2015, she was the academic advisor to the Ecuadorian Minister on Housing and Urban Development for the UN Conference Habitat III. She collaborates with CAF’s program on BiodiverCities, and with the IDB on its BioCities program. She is a Ph.D. candidate in the urban planning department at UCLA. Under the advice of Susanna Hecht, she is writing a dissertation on the urban history of Amazonia, with a focus on indigenous systems of territorial planning and colonial disruptions.
Dr. Gabriel Cartagena is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and a member of the Medical Staff at Yale New Haven Health. He is the clinical psychologist for the Yale Psycho-Oncology Program (YPOP) and lead clinician of the current mental health program at Yale Cancer Center/Smilow Cancer Hospital.
He earned his doctorate in Clinical Psychology at University of Florida specializing in Health Psychology and focusing on the psychosocial treatment of chronic medical conditions, such as cancer and HIV, in adults and young adults. He completed his clinical fellowship and residency training at Yale School of Medicine and VA Connecticut Healthcare System, respectively, with emphases in Behavioral Medicine.
Dr. Cartagena’s clinical care and advocacy are person-centered and rooted in humility, dialogue, and growth. Dr. Cartagena advocates for every cancer survivor to receive comprehensive, culturally-informed care, express their needs through and beyond treatment, and live a value-based life. He also engages in health communication in public and professional spaces, delivering targeted science communication for the public regarding cancer, mental health, culture, stigma, and quality of life. He focuses these same skills on healthcare teams, providing support and facilitating conversations among providers regarding burn out, mental health, culture, stigma, and effective communication strategies. He translates these professional passions further into the public sphere, with a passion for writing to the public on the effects of misinformation, public health, trauma, trust, and policy on individuals’ physical and mental health. He aims to strengthen this passion and enhance dialogue and communication to better public health as a Public Voices Fellow.
Jean-Ju Chung is Associate Professor of Cellular and Molecular Physiology at Yale University School of Medicine. Dr. Chung received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Seoul National University, Korea, and her Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University, followed by postdoctoral training at Harvard Medical School. As a cell biologist and reproductive physiologist, Dr. Chung focuses on elucidating cellular signaling and molecular mechanisms that regulate sperm motility and fertility. Dr. Chung is a world leader and expert in ion channel and fertilization research and strives to translate her research on the sperm CatSper calcium channel into more options in reproductive medicine for both men and women. Dr. Chung’s scholarly contributions have been recognized by Web of Science as a Highly Cited Researcher in 2019 and 2020 by with the top 1% citation in the field and by ScholarGPS as a Top Scholar in the top 0.5% worldwide in 2024. Dr. Chung was selected by Yale Venture and Springboard Enterprise as one of five women innovators to pitch ideas at Yale’s Dolphin Tank in 2021, and won the Audience Choice Award and Blavatnik Innovation Fund at Yale LifeScience PitchFest 2021. Dr. Chung has been supported by the U.S. National Institute of Health (NIH), Grantham Foundation, and Male Contraceptive Initiative. She served on the Program Committee for the 2021 Annual Meeting and co-chaired the Industrial Relations Committee for the American Society of Andrology and has served as a peer reviewer for the European Research Council, German Research Foundation, and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council. She is currently an editorial board member of several journals including eLife and Biology of Reproduction, and a member of grant study sections for NIH.Alexis Cordone
Dr. Alexis Cordone grew up in Terryville, Connecticut. As an undergraduate student, she double majored in biology and religious studies at the University of Connecticut. She also volunteered as an emergency medical technician for nearly ten years, sparking her initial interest in medicine. She then went to medical school, also at UConn, where she simultaneously completed a master’s degree in public health. After medical school, Dr. Cordone completed her medical residency in Emergency Medicine followed by a fellowship in Pediatric Emergency Medicine, both at Yale, where she also obtained another master’s degree in medical education. She is currently in her final year of fellowship and also works as an emergency department attending physician.
With a career spanning over 20 years, Dr. Claudia has been instrumental in leading efforts toward mental health promotion and substance use prevention in public schools, clinical settings, and research institutions. As a behavioral scientist and licensed professional counselor (LPC), she brings a unique blend of academic knowledge and practical experience to her approach—strongly emphasizing evidence-based research to inform youth-centered programs, policies, and structures. A core focus of her work is amplifying youth perspectives and experiences, ensuring their voices are central to decision-making processes.
Dr. Claudia’s professional journey began as a public school teacher in Connecticut and a bilingual school counselor in New York City. She was then part of the founding leadership team at Bard High School Early College in Newark, NJ. Observing the impact and reach of science, she transitioned to a 10-year career in applied research at the Yale School of Medicine where she was promoted to ladder-track faculty. Her research was funded by the prestigious Yale Center for Clinical Investigation Scholar Award and sponsored by the National Institutes of Health/National Center for Advancing Translational Science. With this funding, she led her team and a youth advisory board in the development and evaluation of a digital game targeting suicide prevention in young people who misuse substances. Dr. Claudia has disseminated her research widely through publications in peer-reviewed journals and national presentations.
Dr. Claudia holds a Master of Arts (M.A.) in Applied Psychology from New York University and a Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) in Health and Behavior Studies from Columbia University Teachers College. She brings an unwavering commitment to improving youth wellbeing through her extensive research experience and ongoing work in the field of mental health promotion and prevention.
You can follow Dr. Claudia on Instagram @drclaudiaBTWF and on Twitter at @DrClaudiaSantiF.
Ángel A. Escamilla García is an assistant professor of Sociology. His research primarily uses qualitative methods and focuses on the international migration of vulnerable groups like children, LGBTQ+ individuals, and indigenous migrants. He is especially interested in understanding how violence shapes these groups’ migration journeys. Ángel is currently writing a book that explores how migrant youth from Central America deal with the unpreventable violence they face as they move through Mexico on their way to the U.S. He is also working on a project that explores the role of language in the international migration experience of indigenous youth migrants from Guatemala. His next project will focus on the communities of migrants that are forming in Mexico as a result of the U.S. and Mexico’s immigration policies. Ángel’s research has been published in journals like Sociology of Race and Ethnicity and the Journal on Migration and Human Security Migration and has won numerous prizes and grants, including most recently the best dissertation award from the Latin American Studies Association, Mexico Section. Ángel earned his Ph.D. in Sociology from Northwestern University where he was a Presidential Fellow, and he completed his postdoctoral work at Cornell University’s Migrations Initiative.
Naga Sasidhar Kanaparthy is an accomplished Internal Medicine Physician with over 11 years of clinical experience. He earned his medical degree from Warangal, India, and completed his Internal Medicine Residency in Connecticut, followed by a Master’s in Public Health from Tennessee. A lifelong learner, he is currently pursuing a Clinical Informatics Fellowship and a Master’s in Health Science degree from Yale.
Dr. Kanaparthy has worked in diverse healthcare environments, demonstrating strong leadership and adaptability. He has served as Internal Medicine Faculty at New York Medical College and earned certification as a Physician Executive from the American Association for Physician Leadership. He further honed his leadership skills through a Fellowship in Leadership in Hospital Medicine from Geisinger Medical Center.
As a Physician, Clinical Informatician, Vice President of the Yale Resident and Fellow Senate, Technology, and an Alpha Omega Alpha faculty member, Dr. Kanaparthy understands patient care and the strategies required to implement healthcare technologies, especially in large healthcare settings. Passionate about the intersection of healthcare and technology, he envisions a future with personalized healthcare.
Outside of his professional life, he loves photography and enjoys traveling and exploring new places, constantly seeking new experiences and perspectives.
Pamela Kunz
Dr. Pamela Kunz is an Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Oncology at Yale School of Medicine where she also serves as the Director of the Center for GI Cancers and Division Chief of GI Medical Oncology at Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital. She received her medical degree from the Dartmouth Geisel School of Medicine. Her postgraduate training included a medical residency, chief residency, and oncology fellowship at Stanford University School of Medicine. Dr. Kunz is an international leader in the treatment and clinical research of patients with GI malignancies and neuroendocrine tumors (NETs). She holds several key leadership positions in the field including President Emeritus of the North American Neuroendocrine Tumor Society, recent past Chair of the Neuroendocrine Tumor Taskforce of the NCI and standing member of FDA’s Oncology Drug Advisory Committee. She was recently appointed Editor-in-Chief of JCO Oncology Advances. In addition to her focus on NETs, she is a leading voice for promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in medicine. She served as the Vice Chief of DEI for the Section of Medical Oncology at Yale School of Medicine and in 2021, she was awarded ‘Woman Oncologist of the Year’ by Women Leaders in Oncology for her work in promoting gender equity.
Yii-Jan Lin
Yii-Jan Lin is a historian of ideas and biblical texts. She is the author of Immigration and Apocalypse: How the Book of Revelation Shaped American Immigration (Yale 2024) and The Erotic Life of Manuscripts: New Testament Textual Criticism and the Biological Sciences (Oxford 2016).
She is Associate Professor of New Testament at Yale Divinity School, where she teaches the critical study of ancient texts and their interpretation, especially in relation to race and gender. She has made numerous appearances on radio, podcasts, and documentaries to comment on race, immigration, apocalypse, and gender.
Born in the San Francisco Bay Area to first generation immigrants, Lin studied English Literature, earning her bachelor’s degree from Pomona College and master’s degree from the University of Chicago. Shifting her focus to ancient and biblical texts, she graduated with her PhD in religious studies from Yale University. She has lived in Taipei, Taiwan; Heidelberg, Germany; Exeter, England; and Beijing, China. As faculty at Yale, she is currently based in New Haven, Connecticut.
Dr. Brooke Redmond
Dr. Brooke Redmond is an attending neonatologist at Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital and an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, Yale School of Medicine. She leads the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit as the Medical Director at Waterbury Hospital where she is also the Chair of Pediatrics. She is the creator and director of the 24/7 BABY program, an innovative partnership between Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine and First Responders/Emergency Medical Services.
Dr. Redmond is a graduate of Amherst College, and she was a high school science teacher in Washington DC prior to becoming a doctor. She earned her medical degree from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons where she was inducted into the Gold Humanism Honor Society, followed by Pediatric Residency at the University of Massachusetts and Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine Fellowship at the Yale School of Medicine. She is a Certified Healthcare Simulation Educator (CHSE), an Instructor Mentor for the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Neonatal Resuscitation Program (NRP), an Internationally Board-Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC), and a steering committee member for the AAP Pediatric First Aid & Safety Committee. She works with families prenatally through Yale’s Fetal Care Center (FCC), and she serves as a volunteer educator and content expert for regional EMS and fire services. Her clinical and research interests include education, narrative medicine, neonatal simulation, prehospital neonatal resuscitation, telehealth, community medicine, and breastfeeding equity and lactation support.
Janitza L. Montalvo-Ortiz
Dr. Janitza L. Montalvo-Ortiz is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry, Division of Human Genetics at Yale School of Medicine and a Research Biologist at the CT VA. Dr. Montalvo-Ortiz is a neuroscientist with a strong expertise in molecular genetics. She completed her BA in Biology at the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus and obtained her PhD in Neuroscience from Northwestern University at Chicago. Her main research interests are to investigate the genetic and epigenetics underpinnings of neuropsychiatric disorders using cutting edge bioinformatics tools to help dissect the mechanisms involved and identify biomarkers and treatments for these disorders. She is a co-founder and co-leader of the Latin American Genomics Consortium and the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium Substance Use Disorders Epigenetics workgroup, and the Yale site PI of the All of Us Research Program. She has received multiple awards, including the NARSAD Young Investigator Award and the VA CDA-2 to study PTSD trajectories in veterans using multi-omics approaches. She is also a DP1 awardee via a NIDA Avenir Award for the investigation of joint single-nucleus multiomics of opioid use disorder in the human brain.Yoehan Oh
Yoehan Oh, Ph.D. (he/him) is a Postdoctoral Associate and Lecturer at Yale University, where he conducts historical and social studies of Asian Americans in Computer Science and co-organizes the “Asian Americans and STEM” initiative. He also contributes to anti-racist research in the Yale Graphics Lab. His research examines how technoscientific expertise and products, self-determination and subjugation, and social and inter-cultural identities are shaped hand in hand, with a particular focus on computing, and Asian and Asian American contexts. As a humanities and interpretive social studies researcher, he leverages his cross-disciplinary background in both STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and the humanities. Born and raised in South Korea, he earned his B.S. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Seoul National University (SNU). After working as a software research engineer at LG Electronics, he transitioned to an interdisciplinary academic career, earning a master’s degree in History and Philosophy of Science from SNU and a Ph.D. in Science and Technology Studies from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Currently, he is working on a book project that examines a sociotechnical history of Naver, a Korean tech giant, exploring themes of tech expansionism, platform protectionism, infrastructural sovereignty, and ambivalent counter-practices/discourses to web/data/A.I. colonialism. His recent work has also focused on Asian Americans in the history of computer science and engineering and transnational, inter-ethnic sociotechnical spheres. His research has been funded by Jong Ha Scholarship Foundation, and D. Kim Foundation for the History of Science and Technology in East Asia, and his collaborative research has been featured in Time. At Yale, he has taught an undergraduate seminar on the global history of computing between the U.S. and East Asia, cross-listed on Computer Science and East Asian Studies major.
Dr Danielle (Dani) Poole, ScD MPH
Dr. Danielle (Dani) Poole is a population health scientist notable for her contributions to the evidence base for crisis preparedness and response. Within the broader field of population health in crises, her work is centered around two themes:
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assessing and responding to the needs of crisis-affected populations, and
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adapting research methods for complex settings.
To address these lines of inquiry, Dr. Poole applies methods spanning the statistical, geospatial, and epidemiological sciences. Her interdisciplinary approach illuminates the interactions of individual, social, structural, and “place” determinants of pressing public health challenges to inform policy. Recent and ongoing research contributions include advancing quantitative methods for detecting patterns of potential war crimes, measuring population health needs in ongoing conflicts, and generating knowledge of the climate-migrant-health nexus. Most recently, Dr. Poole has extended her research agenda on health in crises to firearm injury prevention projects.
Dr. Poole has served as an expert consultant for the International Organization for Migration, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the World Health Organization, the United Nations Population Fund, and the U.S. Agency for International Development.
Dr. Poole completed Postdoctoral training at the Neukom Institute for Computational Science at Dartmouth College. She received an ScD from the Harvard School of Public Health, an MPH from Brown University, and a BA from Seattle University.
Dr. Ransome investigates how social capital, social connectedness, and spirituality, influence mental and physical health and wellbeing, and socioeconomic prosperity. His mission is to create interventions that reduce racial and geographic-related disparities and help fast-track people into their divine destiny. His philosophy embodies the words of Dr. Howard Thurman, “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who come alive.”
Melissa Weimer
Dr. Melissa Weimer is a physician and medical educator who is board certified in Internal Medicine and Addiction Medicine. She is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Public Health at Yale School of Medicine and the Medical Director of the Yale Addiction Medicine Consult Service at Yale New Haven Hospital. Dr. Weimer treats hospitalized individuals with substance use disorder and works to engage them on a path toward health. She is a nationally recognized medical educator who has led multiple efforts to increase health clinician knowledge about substance use disorder and its treatment.Contact Us
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