Girls education and health equity: a panel discussion

Melinda Lemke, Assistant Professor, Educational Leadership and Policy

Dr. Lemke is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy, where she is a part of the Educational Administration and Economics, Education Policy Analysis Programs.  She also is the Program Advisor for the Education Leadership and Policy for Equity Minor, a Community for Global Health Equity Fellow, and a Gender Institute Affiliate. Dr. Lemke’s research broadly focuses on educational policy, the politics of education, and underserved youth populations.  She has researched curriculum policy reform and implementation, human trafficking policy and prevention, immigration policy, and gender issues in education.  Prior to joining the faculty at UB, Dr. Lemke was a Postdoctoral Research Associate for the Wales Observatory on Human Rights of Children and Young People within the College of Law and Criminology at Swansea University in the United Kingdom.  There she conducted interdisciplinary research and worked with community partners to address policy gaps related to largescale youth displacement within the European Union.  Dr. Lemke also has over a decade of combined U.S. public school and international teaching and administrative experience.  Overall, her work at UB is committed to building strong, equity-minded partnerships between schools, public sector entities, and the research community.

Shaanta Murshid, Assistant Professor, Social Work

Shaanta Murshid’s teaching interests include research, diversity and oppression, immigration, international social work, and violence. She was a member of the Doctoral Program Executive Committee at the Rutgers University School of Social Work and an appointed member of the Board of the Doctoral Student Association at Rutgers University School of Social Work. She was also awarded a Saathi of Rochester Excellence in Education Award and an Excellence in Social Work Education Award from Rutgers University. Murshid's social consciousness on both national and international levels has guided her talks and publications in both scholarly journals and popular media, including her 2014 article, "The killings at Bangladesh's Bihari Camp – Murder mystery or murder with impunity?" in India's Frontier Weekly.

Pavani K. Ram, Associate Professor, Epidemiology and Environmental Health

Dr. Pavani K. Ram has had a commitment to improving child survival since the beginning of her public health career. Between 2006 and now, that commitment has been demonstrated by her pursuit to understand better the protective effects, measurement, and behavior change concerns of prevention and treatment strategies for common childhood infections. After completing medical training in internal medicine, she served as an Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) Officer and then as a Medical Epidemiologist at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In 2005, Dr. Ram joined the faculty of the University at Buffalo's Department of Epidemiology and Environmental Health. During her public health career, Dr. Ram has conducted numerous outbreak investigations, participated in the CDC response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, as well as the anthrax bioterrorism events of that year. Dr. Ram has gained extensive global health experience in child survival, with a focus on prevention of infections in young children. With collaborators in numerous countries in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, her team has completed several randomized controlled trials of handwashing in household and school settings, as well as evaluations of large-scale handwashing and sanitation programs. Since July 2016, Dr. Ram has been serving as a Senior Medical Advisor for Newborn Health at USAID.  She has the privilege of mentoring post-doctoral fellows, doctoral students in epidemiology and other disciplines, master’s of public health students, medical students, and undergraduate students.​