The Power of Music
Our Mission
We harness the transformative power of music, culture and behavior change science to create resources that deepen health literacy and improve health outcomes in underserved communities.
Our Vision
Youth and families around the globe are living with the knowledge and skills to make healthier choices, inspire health and healing within their communities, and achieve health equity.
READ OUR RESEARCH
We are committed to an iterative cycle of program evaluation, academic research and resource refinement.
WE ARE A COLLECTIVE
Board of Directors

Fresh’s peers have dubbed him “The World’s Greatest Entertainer,” for his unrivaled ability to electrify any crowd, of any age, race or gender, night after night. Pre-pandemic, Fresh averaged 200 live performances per year for 20 straight years – a rare feat for an any artist, especially one whose career has remained active for nearly four decades, thanks, in part, to his cultural classics, “The Show,” and, “La Di Da Di,” both released in the mid 1980’s, when he was a teen, as duets with fellow rap legend Slick Rick. To date, “La Di Da Di” holds the unique honor as one of the top five most sampled songs of all time.
On and off the road, Fresh is a lifelong activist, with a proven commitment to using his talents and resources to unite and inspire social justice. He is the founding artist and honorary board member of Hip Hop Public Health, a non-profit dedicated to inspiring health behavior change and achieving health equity in communities of color through the power of music, art, culture, and science.
After these past few years of unthinkable tumult and tragedy, Fresh seeks to sonically transport people to happier times and unite hip-hop and go-go audiences with his newest full length album, “This One’s For Chuck Brown.” Ever reverent to those who have inspired him and ever ready to use his art to uplift, educate, and ignite positive change, Doug continues to be an ever so Fresh breath of air.

Dr. Williams is the Founder and Board Chair of Hip Hop Public Health, an internationally recognized organization that works with iconic Hip Hop influencers to uses art, music, and science to promote healthy behaviors, health literacy, and health equity. He is a board member of the Partnership for a Healthier America whose honorary chair is former First Lady Michelle Obama, where he helps guide health equity-related activities. Dr. Williams is an expert on COVID-19 vaccine acceptance in communities of color and COVID-related health disparities. He has received many prestigious international, national, regional, and local awards. These include the European Stroke Research Foundation Investigator of the Year award, two-time Columbia University Outstanding Teacher of the Year award, American Heart Association’s Trailblazer Award, and a National Humanism in Medicine award from the Association of American Medical Colleges. Dr. Williams has been named on Fast Company Magazine’s 100 Most Creative People list, Root 100’s most influential Blacks in America list, Advertising Age’s Creative 50 list, and consecutive New York Magazine's Best Doctors list.

Before joining HHPH, Lori served as Vice President of Healthy Lifestyles at the YMCA of Greater New York, spearheading all aspects of the preventative health and wellness portfolio for the largest YMCA in the United States with a key focus on health innovation, development of youth fitness programming and scaling chronic disease prevention programs to meet the diverse needs of New York City's communities. Lori was the principal architect of the award winning Y-MVP Teen Fitness Challenge – an innovative program blending fun fitness activities with an interactive mobile app designed to recognize, reward and motivate NYC's young people to increase their daily levels of Moderate to Vigorous Physical activity.
Prior to joining the Y in 2011, Lori served as the Executive Director of the Office of School Wellness Programs at New York City’s Department of Education, established under the Bloomberg administration in collaboration with NYC’s Health Department. She implemented policies and designed initiatives to increase the quality and quantity of physical and health education for 1.1 million students in 1,700 public schools. Highlights under Lori’s tenure include the creation of a city-wide sports and fitness league for hundreds of middle schools, introducing classroom-based physical activity curriculum, launching school wellness council grant programs, and spearheading the implementation of NYC FITNESSGRAM, an annual student fitness assessment, which is now one of the country’s largest web-based longitudinal data base on childhood obesity and physical fitness.
Raised in Brooklyn, Lori attended New York City’s public schools and earned a B.A. from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in Communications and Graphic Design, and a M.A. in Physical Education from Adelphi University in Garden City, NY, where she is currently an Adjunct Faculty member in the Department of Exercise Science, Health Studies, Physical Education and Sport. Lori personally embraces physical activity and her love of music into her daily life as a yoga enthusiast, an aspiring DJ and a spinning instructor who still teaches a weekly cycling class at Crunch Fitness in Brooklyn.

Since completing his training, Dr. Joseph has worked in academic surgery for his entire career. He has had the opportunity to serve as a visiting professor for the Colombian Association of Surgery and as an advisor to Governor Abbott (Texas) regarding emergency and trauma services. He was also the Vice Chair of Surgery at Texas Tech, where he was instrumental in establishing the residency in the Permian Basin and an acclaimed rural surgery training program.
Dr. Joseph serves on the editorial board of six journals and is a reviewer for numerous others. He was the editor for a recently published book on Point-of-Care-Ultrasound for First Responders. Recently, he established the ACGME accredited general surgery residency at Valley Health System in Las Vegas NV and serves as an Associate Professor of Surgery.
Dr. Joseph has worked with numerous healthcare businesses and private equity bankers, raised money for charitable organizations, and travelled to 3rd world countries to expand medical education and outreach. His goal is to use technology and innovation to enhance healthcare delivery, prevent illness, and save lives throughout the world.

Gillian credits her personal and professional life to strong family support, her parents and four siblings. “My parents are my role models and champions. They taught us that the quality and depth of the footprints that you leave are as important as those that you choose to follow. I hope that the footprints that I have left so far can help others and make my family proud.”
Gillian is the former vice president of the Aetna Foundation where she conceptualized and led national and international investments in community wellbeing, quality health care and health equity. Gillian’s work in philanthropy also includes the W.K. Kellogg Foundation where she worked to improve the health of vulnerable and low-income populations. There she held responsibility for impact and evaluation for the foundation’s investments in health and special cross-sectoral initiatives. Her professional experience includes a leadership role within the Pan American Health Organization, the regional body of the World Health Organization. In this role, she worked to strengthen health systems with governments, policymakers and non-governmental organizations across multiple sectors including education, health, human services and finance.
Beyond her experience in philanthropy and government, Gillian has taught at the Harvard School of Public Health and currently teaches in the graduate leadership program at the School of Public Policy, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She completed her postdoctoral research at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute and the Brigham and Women’s Hospital, along with a doctorate in public health from Harvard University with concentrations in policy and the social determinants of health. She holds a master’s in public health from the University of Michigan, a doctorate in dental surgery from the University of Detroit Mercy and completed her practice residency at New York Hospital. Her undergraduate degree was earned at the University of the West Indies. She is also an active member of national, state and local boards and working groups committed to promoting health, health equity and economic development.

Eric began his career as a specialist in comprehensive health education and coordinator of the history-making Safe Schools Program for LGBT Students with the Massachusetts Department of Education. He later served young people throughout New York City as the Coordinator of Arts & Media Education Programs with the NYC LGBT Community Center. Eric then spent seven years supporting 1700 schools and one million public school students via the New York City Department of Education and New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, serving as Comprehensive Health Education Coordinator for Manhattan and the Bronx, Deputy Director of Fitness & Physical Education for the five boroughs, and Founding Director of the city’s first Youth Development Resource Center. During this period, he co-authored the U.S. National Standards for Health Education (2nd Edition) and served as an adjunct professor of health education at Hunter College, City University of New York. After completing an MBA in Management & Organizational Behavior, Eric became Director of Organizational Talent Management and Development for the Department of Education before joining London-based leadership strategy firm YSC Consulting.
Eric is also a graduate of Tufts University (American Studies / Peace & Justice Studies) and a member of the Dramatists’ Guild of America. He is the author/co-author of a wide range of published academic, creative, and professional works, including award-winning case studies on diversity and leadership and a theatrical parody for adults of children’s television cartoons. Eric lives in Brooklyn, New York, where years of coaching around the world and teaching throughout the northeastern U.S. have nonetheless left him largely unprepared for his role as father of three awesome, adorable, and mischievous kids.

She is best known for her work investigating how social environments and people’s understanding of their experiences in them cause insider/outsider dynamics. One stream of her research employs randomized control trials to understand how stereotype threat and social identity threat can heighten stress that, when severe, can undermine cognitive performance. She also designs interventions aimed at lessening threat, resulting in greater belonging, stronger social ties and improved cognitive performance.
Her second stream of research organizes and make sense of scientific evidence related to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). She explores how science experts and lay people come to trust scientific evidence related to DEI and whether such scientific evidence inspires behavior change. The ultimate goal motivating all of her research is help develop and foster inclusive environments that allow diverse social groups to thrive and succeed.
Dr. Purdie-Greenaway has authored over 60 publications that have appeared in journals such as Science, Science Advances, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and Psychological Science. She has been awarded grants from the National Science Foundation, Russell Sage Foundation and the Spencer Foundation. Currently, she also serves on the editorial board of Psychological Review.
Dr. Purdie-Greenaway is a thought leader on strategies to enhance DEI in organizations. She currently serves on the board of Burberry’s Global Council for Diversity and Inclusion. Select clients, past and present, include Goldman Sachs, Ernst & Young, P&G, Aesop, The Broad Institute, Brystol-Meyers Squibb, Genentech, and Spencer Stuart. Her research has been featured in media outlets such as the New York Times, Harvard Business Review, Fortune Magazine, The Atlantic and Scientific American.
She holds an A.B. in psychology from Columbia University (CC ’93) where she lettered in varsity basketball. She also holds a Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Stanford University where she trained under Claude Steele.

Prior to joining Invo, Andrew served as a classroom teacher and school site administrator in Miami-Dade County Public Schools, an Assistant Superintendent in Duval County Public Schools, and the President of Catapult Academy. In Duval, Andrew was responsible for designing, implementing, and monitoring the innovative programs and schools including an Overage Academy, an Early College Career Academy and a contributor to the creation of dedicated public schools for students with both Autism and Dyslexia. Andrew was successful in leading processes that resulted in dramatically increasing the district’s overall and African-American graduation rates, college readiness reading and math rates, and high school accelerated coursework participation and performance rates; all historic highs for the district.
Aside from his work within the school district, Andrew founded a 501(c)(3) non-profit which infused literacy and sports to increase students’ chances at achieving academic and social/emotional success through programming in the United States and Jamaica. Andrew holds a master’s degree in educational leadership from Nova Southeastern University and a bachelor’s degree in Political Science and Secondary Education from the University of Miami.

Hip Hop Public Health matches perfectly with Jim’s commitment to using innovative, inclusive, and highly effective strategies to galvanize lasting healthy lifestyles and engagement by our youth, of all ages. As a former professional percussionist, he has long known the power of music to be used for a higher good.
Based in Indianapolis, IN, Jim currently is CEO of an expanding portfolio of health-based NGOs, such as the International Society for Sports Psychiatry, as well as an incubator for organizations that innovatively use technology to advance health and performance and economic development in the sectors of worksite, healthcare, and sports.
Jim previously served in the public sector in Washington, DC as Director of an HHS national health institute. Before that, he was the historically successful and long-term CEO of the American College of Sports Medicine, headquartered in Indianapolis, making it the world’s largest international organization dedicated to the broad and multi-faceted field of sports medicine and exercise science.
Earlier, Jim was an executive with the American Academy of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery in Washington, DC, and was a principal with an association management firm that specialized in health and science NGOs and political candidates at the U.S. federal level.
Jim has led, created, or co-founded numerous start-up organizations and initiatives that have become established and successful enterprises, such as the Datalys Center on Sports Injury Research and Prevention, the Joint Commission on Sports Medicine and Science, the U.S. National Physical Activity Plan, and the International Association for Worksite Health Promotion.
He also has served as consultant and adviser to more than 100 organizations, including Disney Imagineers, World Health Organization, National Institutes of Health, United Nations, NATO, United States Olympic and Paralympic Olympic Committee, World Bank, and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Jim is a graduate of the University of Alabama, where he earned degrees in organizational development and medical history and policy.

Imani is also the co-founder of Hampton Art Lovers (HAL), an art gallery in Historic Overtown in Miami. HAL was created to showcase the collections of HBCU museums/historic collections and provide a stage for established/emergent contemporary artists. HAL fosters a narrative that promotes the appreciation and purchase of Black art.
Outside of her business ventures, Imani is actively engaged in supporting professional and community organizations. In addition to Hip Hop Public Health, she also sits on the Boards of Directors of the Washington D.C. Advertising Club and the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. Imani is a member of Leadership Greater Washington and Zeta Phi Beta Sorority. She lives in Bowie, MD with her 17-year-old son and adorable bichon frise.

Staff

As the Director of Special Projects, Sittra provides support across the organization for a range of projects, including development, gala and board development work, as well as systems and database management. Sittra understands that the core of organizational growth depends on nurturing relationships between people. It also depends on airtight systems critical in building a culture of philanthropy that touches every part of the fundraising process. Sittra is passionate about Hip Hop Public Health’s work because she has seen first hand the change that access, equity, and education can make in a young person's life and the trajectory of their family’s lives for generations to come.
When Sittra is not at her desk you can find her rooting for Penn State’s Nittany Lions, helping out in her family’s Ethiopian restaurant, or on a spin bike!

Prior to joining Hip Hop Public Health, Lindsey served as Executive Director of the New York City Department of Education’s Office of School Wellness Programs, where she developed and implemented large-scale initiatives to increase equitable access to Health Education, Physical Education and wellness programs for New York City’s one million students. She established policies and practices, paired with practical and accessible resources, to revitalize Health and Physical Education instruction in grades K-12, and to embed sustainable transformation at both the school and system levels. Lindsey embraced opportunities for organizational change and led the Office of School Wellness Programs through an unprecedented expansion from a team of 25 to more than 100, providing a comprehensive and strategic suite of support structures for New York City’s 1,600 public schools, including professional learning, curricular materials, and programs for students, educators and school communities. Lindsey’s career has also included stints in marketing, development, public relations and communications. Lindsey was a founding member of the NYC Mayor’s Sexual Health Education Task Force and served as its Co-Vice-Chair.
Lindsey loves travelling -- especially if it involves some combination of ocean sunrises, mountain-top star-gazing, and good food and wine -- and she also loves coming home to Brooklyn where you can find her doing hot yoga, reading at her neighborhood cafe, and hosting friends for dinner.

When Nayah isn’t working she’s focused on deep restaurant research to find the best foodie/cocktail experience from the sensation of taste to the feeling of ambiance. She enjoys attending community and culture events throughout Brooklyn, spending time with family and friends, and taking long walks that lead to random adventures, and sometimes those walks are flights to a new city with no itinerary!

Over the past 20+ years, Jodie has designed and implemented the cause marketing efforts, programming and brand marketing for an Academy Award winning director/ actor, an NFL and NBA World Champions and multiple GRAMMY Award Winning artists. She has established partnerships with top level brands such as Cartier, American Airlines, Toyota, Coca-Cola, Puma and many more.
Some of Jodie’s acclaimed career highlights include launching and serving as the Executive Director of The Common Ground Foundation with artist/actor “Common”. In this Executive role, she received an Emmy nomination for her “A Minute” campaign around HIV/AIDS testing in 2006. Jodie also served as the first Executive Director of GRAMMY U at The Recording Academy, known best for the GRAMMY Awards. Jodie lent her many talents to develop a unique and fast-growing community of college students, who were pursuing a career in the recording industry. Creating and executing over 200 national branded events a year with the music industry’s most coveted talent and executives.
Jodie is the Founder of The Co-llective Social Impact Agency, that raises standards in cause marketing, philanthropic management, and global social impact campaigns. Some of Jodie’s clients include GRAMMY Award Winning Artist Ne-Yo, Imagine Dragons, Nascimento (Pelé) Foundation, Don’t Mind Me Foundation, Los Angeles Lakers’ JaVale McGee, Tennessee Titans’ Ben Jones, IdTech, StockX, Def Jam, Roc Nation, Patron, Porsche, Sonos and more.
Jodie is a proud foster/adopt mother, advocate for Foster Care awareness and sits on the National Advisory Council for FosterMore. In addition, Jodie is a Board Member for TedX WaterStreet.

Liliana has a B.A. in Communications and French from Rutgers University, and a MBA from NYU’s Stern School of Business. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and her dog, Beau. She is fluent in Portuguese, conversational in Spanish, and welcomes any opportunity to practice her rusty French.

Even when Patrice is not working, she is still kind of working, as she is committed to helping others become healthy in mind, body, and spirit by creating healing experiences for those living through trauma. Patrice resides in DC and enjoys spending time volunteering as a foster for the Humane Rescue Alliance, exercising with her Peloton BGM crew, and collaborating with friends to create trauma healing experiences.


Before joining HHPH, Lori served as Vice President of Healthy Lifestyles at the YMCA of Greater New York, spearheading all aspects of the preventative health and wellness portfolio for the largest YMCA in the United States with a key focus on health innovation, development of youth fitness programming and scaling chronic disease prevention programs to meet the diverse needs of New York City's communities. Lori was the principal architect of the award winning Y-MVP Teen Fitness Challenge – an innovative program blending fun fitness activities with an interactive mobile app designed to recognize, reward and motivate NYC's young people to increase their daily levels of Moderate to Vigorous Physical activity.
Prior to joining the Y in 2011, Lori served as the Executive Director of the Office of School Wellness Programs at New York City’s Department of Education, established under the Bloomberg administration in collaboration with NYC’s Health Department. She implemented policies and designed initiatives to increase the quality and quantity of physical and health education for 1.1 million students in 1,700 public schools. Highlights under Lori’s tenure include the creation of a city-wide sports and fitness league for hundreds of middle schools, introducing classroom-based physical activity curriculum, launching school wellness council grant programs, and spearheading the implementation of NYC FITNESSGRAM, an annual student fitness assessment, which is now one of the country’s largest web-based longitudinal data base on childhood obesity and physical fitness.
Raised in Brooklyn, Lori attended New York City’s public schools and earned a B.A. from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in Communications and Graphic Design, and a M.A. in Physical Education from Adelphi University in Garden City, NY, where she is currently an Adjunct Faculty member in the Department of Exercise Science, Health Studies, Physical Education and Sport. Lori personally embraces physical activity and her love of music into her daily life as a yoga enthusiast, an aspiring DJ and a spinning instructor who still teaches a weekly cycling class at Crunch Fitness in Brooklyn.

Abe has a degree in Accounting and Business Management from Brooklyn College. When he’s not working, you can find Abe playing video games, watching sports, or managing his Fantasy Football team. He also enjoys movies and TV shows, and appreciating life one day at a time.

In 2020, as the pandemic created unprecedented challenges, Melinda shifted her focus to create unprecedented solutions. Recognizing racism as a public health crisis and the life-threatening consequences of health inequity on communities of color, Melinda’s work with Hip Hop Public Health combines the power of culturally appropriate and accurate healthcare messaging with access to corporate workforces to create a new model of public/private partnership. Melinda’s mission is to bring together the power of corporations and philanthropy to amplify Hip Hop Public Health’s work.
Melinda’s entrepreneurial background includes co-founding PlumParty.com, a celebrations site that disrupted the party store concept and was credited with revolutionizing how online retail interacted with consumers. Prior to PlumParty.com, Melinda was a Vice President at Dillon, Read & Co. Inc. where she helped structure and execute $3 billion of taxable and tax-exempt healthcare financings, including the first ever financing for the NYC Health and Hospitals Corporation. She was a Founding Board Member/Chair of Children’s Hope Foundation, an innovative non-profit serving the needs of children with HIV/AIDS. A decade-long volunteer at Sanctuary for Families serving the needs of victims of domestic violence, Melinda was most recently Co-Chair of the Family Council, developing age-appropriate ways to engage children and foster volunteerism at a young age.
Melinda is a native New Yorker, a proud mom to Charlotte and Oliver, and a graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Business School.
Research & Development Team




Ewelina’s research involves a hybrid of psychology, public health, music, social justice, and innovation. She is passionate about the role of multidisciplinary fields, media, arts and music in health behavior change. With Dr. Williams, she developed the Multisensory Multilevel Health Education Model, a theoretical framework for culturally sensitive, evidence-based health education. Ewelina is a recipient of several awards, including Fulbright Scholarship and International Postgraduate Research Scholarship from the Australian Government. She received the Innovative Leader in Magazine Media Award from Yale University for her work on Lifelab, a project that brings the science of psychology from academia to our daily lives.

Sandra received her bachelor's in chemistry from Wagner College in Staten Island. Sandra's undergraduate research focused primarily on global public health issues, particularly contamination and nutrition projects in Bangladesh and Kenya. In addition to her research, she continued tutoring and teaching children in various disciplines in NYC. After graduating, she worked in CUNY Start, a program that prepares underserved NYC youth to become college-proficient in writing and math. Prior to joining Hip Hop Public Health as a research assistant, she focused on community work at Rutgers University with environmental injustice research.

Advisory Council
Darryl DMC McDaniels
Chuck D
Ashanti
Cheryl “Salt” James
Monique Hedmann-Maxey, MD MPH
Dr. Olugbenga Ogedegbe
John Allegrante, PhD
Ana Cepin, MD
Rob Shepardson
Scott Silverstein
Ian Ellis James
Raymond Javdan, Esq.
Mindy Feldman Hecht
Kelly Fogel
Tony Drootin
Alexandra DeSorbo Quinn
Valentina Nicolette
James “Jimmy” Maynes
Terry Nelson
Maibe Ponet
Pete Colon
Dana Austin
Jonathan Fassberg
Join the Collective
Join our diverse community of educators, entertainers and health professionals empowering youth with the transformative power of hip-hop. Get special access to free resources, videos, music, and other perks through our ambassador program!
“I get to interact with the next generation. I get the opportunity to share information that can help change their lives.”
Easy ADDirector of Hip Hop Educational Programming
“Do you know what are GO, SLOW and WHOA foods? My students know! Thank you Hip Hop Public Health for teaching healthy eating and living in such a fun way!”
Eileen TiradoAdaptive Physical Education Teacher, West Palm Beach, Florida
“The Hip Hop H.E.A.L.S. program exceeding all of our expectations. I think you have tapped into a way to connect with our students and will make a positive impact in their eating choices. ”
Nicholas StavolaPhysical Education Teacher, NYC
“The National Fitness Foundation believes in the power of music to motivate students to be fit for life. That's why we are so proud of our partnership with Hip Hop Public Health.”
Chris WattsExecutive Director, National Foundation on Fitness, Sports & Nutrition.