Center for Participatory Research

Staff

CPR Director: Nina Wallerstein (Dr.P.H., MPH) is a professor in the Dept. of Family and Community Medicine. She currently is the director of the Center for Participatory Research, and the director of the developing community engagement and research component of the Clinical Translational Science Center, in addition to Sr. fellow within Robert Wood Johnson Center for Health Policy. Her current research interests focus on community capacity and health development in tribal communities, culturally appropriate translational intervention research, participatory evaluation, and community-based participatory research processes and outcomes.

Associate Director: Julie Lucero (PhD Student, MPH) is a Robert Wood Johnson Center for Health Policy at UNM doctoral fellow, and Ford Foundation Honorable Mention. She is currently beginning her dissertation work at the UNM Dept. of Communication & Journalism in Health Communication, and member of the Bernalillo County Community Health Council. Julie was born in raised in northern New Mexico's Espanola Valley known as a tri-cultural area consisting largely of Spanish, Mexican and Native American populations.

Associate Scientist II: Lorenda Belone (PhD, MPH) is Dine' (Navajo Nation) from the reservation community of Mexican Springs, NM. In 2010, she successfully defended her dissertation work obtaining her PhD in Health Communication within the UNM Dept. of Communication & Journalism, and former Robert Wood Johnson Center for Health Policy fellow. Lorenda is currently Principal Investigator on a 4-Year Native American Centers for Health (NARCH) funded grant, partnering with a southern New Mexico tribe adapting a culturally-supported-intervention curriculum integrating evidence-based approaches; building upon previous partnerships with other New Mexico tribes.

Associate Scientist I: Rebecca Rae (MCRP, MWR) is from the Jicarilla Apache Nation located in northern New Mexico. She is an evaluator with the Healthy Native Communities Partnership Inc. which is a non-profit organization that supports capacity building, leadership development, partnership, and networking so that Native communities realize their own vision of wellness. Rebecca is a primary contact for work with Dr. Belone on a NARCH funded grant partnering with a southern New Mexico tribe adapting a culturally-supported-intervention curriculum integrating evidence-based approaches; building upon previous partnerships with other New Mexico tribes.

Associate Scientist I: Greg Tafoya (MPH) is from Santa Clara Pueblo known as Kha’p’oo Owinge, or “village of the wild roses" located in northern New Mexico, and also of Sauk & Fox tribal descent. Greg is currently focusing on investigating promoters and inhibitors to success on a nationwide study of CBPR partnerships. He is also interested in expanding scientific knowledge around the Extreme Sport (ES) movement, and use of ES with high-risk minority youth as prevention/intervention strategy, and alternative intervention research designs involving Network Analysis.