Annual Report Feb 16 2021

Meet Our Faculty Members
Alisha Redelfs, Assistant Professor
Dr. Redelfs is a translational scientist dedicated to making best practices in health accessible and
available to all communities. Her research centers on healthy eating and active living, utilizationfocused
evaluation, and communicating complexity within a community context.
Chantel Sloan, Associate Professor
Chantel teaches about infectious disease prevention and control and medical geography. Her
research interests include respiratory health, genetics, epidemiology, and viral infections.
Lori Spruance, Assistant Professor
Lori teaches classes related to program planning and evaluation and policy affecting obesity. Her
research interests include childhood obesity prevention, public health nutrition, physical activity,
and school-based research.
Evan Thacker, Associate Professor
Evan is a chronic disease epidemiologist. He studies connections of cardiovascular and metabolic
health with neurological health in older adults. For example, recently he has been investigating why
older adults who get new-onset epilepsy are more likely to have subsequent strokes and dementia
than older adults without epilepsy. He teaches courses on health and disease, biostatistics, and
epidemiology.
Rosemary Thackeray, Assistant to the President for Assessment and Planning
Rosemary was appointed Assistant to the President for Assessment and Planning in July, 2019,
after serving as an Associate Dean in the College of Life Sciences. Her research interests include
social marketing, social media, technology, and women’s health.
Steve Thygerson, Associate Professor
Dr. Thygerson teaches Occupational Health and Safety and Environmental Toxicology. His
research focuses on building global occupational health capacity including occupational health
exposure assessments in various industry sectors. This includes brick factories of South Asia and
the mining and automotive industries in Africa.
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Josh West, Professor
Josh researches health behaviors, including ways to measure and change behavior. He applies
this to undernutrition, overnutrition, physical activity, and emerging technologies. He has
worked domestically and in South America, Central America, Africa, and Asia. He teaches health
promotion classes to undergraduate and graduate students.