NACHW Webinar: National Day of Racial Healing
NACHW invites Community Health Workers (CHWs) and allies across the nation to join us for our first annual webinar to honor the National Day of Racial Healing on January 17th. During this webinar, attendees will learn about the newly endorsed APHA policy recognizing CHWs roles as racial health advocates and learn about the historical role of CHWs as healers. Learn more about the National Day of Racial Healing here.
Hear from Rumana Shams Rabbani and Abdul Hafeedh bin Abdullah, Co-chairs of the APHA CHW Section Policy Committee. Rumana and Abdul will be presenting the American Public Health Association’s Policy Announcement: A Strategy to Address Racism and Violence as Public Health Priorities: Community Health Workers Advancing Equity & Violence Prevention
Date and time: Tuesday, January 17th from 4-5pm EST
About the presenters
Rumana Shams Rabbani was born in Dhaka, Bangladesh, one of the poorest and most populated countries in the world. She was exposed to severe lack of chronic social and health security that included witnessing poor mothers and their children dying on the streets of Dhaka.
As an immigrant to America, Rumana lived experience sits at the intersectionality of – an immigrant woman experiencing racism and a survivor of Domestic Violence.
Rumana received her Master’s in Health Administration (MHA) focusing on strategic management. She is currently a Doctoral student in the Health Policy & Management Department minoring in Implementation Science at the Gillings School of Global Public Health, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Rumana is also a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy Research Scholar. Her RWJF HPRS dissertation work provides the aims and methodological approach for the 2022 pre-APHA CHW Dismantling Structural Racism & Classism National Workshop co-designed and co-led by CHWs. Rumana has been the PI for the past eight years focusing on sustainable and equitable pay for the CHW workforce. She is the co-Chair of the APHA CHW Section Policy Committee where she facilitated / co-led the APHA CHW Policy statement: C1 – A Strategy to Address Racism and Violence as Public Health Priorities: Community Health Workers Advancing Equity & Violence Prevention Title. She serves as the Chair of the Policy Committee of the Community Based Workforce Alliance
Locally, in North Carolina Rumana is on the Advisory Board for Sokoto House located in Wilmington, North Carolina. As Co- Founder of CommUnity Healing through Activism and Strategic Mobilization, Rumana advances Racial Equity and uplifts CHW culture within North Carolina’s statewide CDC COVID Resiliency funded initiative.
Abdul Hafeedh bin Abdullah was born and raised in San Bernardino, California during Americas war on drugs and mass incarceration era. Abdullah first experienced incarceration at age 9 and by age 17 he was sentenced to prison as an adult for 8 years. While incarcerated Abdullah was inspired to shift his world view and began to tenaciously pursue a journey of self and community healing and restoration.
In 2011, Abdullah was introduced to the CDC funded Multnomah County Health Department (MCHD) Striving to Reduce Youth Violence Everywhere (STRYVE). Abdullah co-led a successful implementation of the program and in 2017 he adapted and began to implement a community-centered and community-driven version of the MCHD STRYVE 2011-2016 program inside North Carolina Cape Fear Region now titled a Community-Based Public-Health response to Violence.
Abdullah is the Executive Director of Quality Life Blueprint and Founding Executive Director of Sokoto House (Cultural Hub and Community Development Center) in Wilmington North Carolina. He also serves as the Co-Chair for the American Public Health Association CHW Section Policy Committee where he co-led the APHA CHW Policy statement: C1 – A Strategy to Address Racism and Violence as Public Health Priorities: Community Health Workers Advancing Equity & Violence Prevention. As Co- Founder of CommUnity Healing through Activism and Strategic Mobilization (CHASM) Abdullah advances Racial Equity and uplifts CHW culture within North Carolina’s statewide CDC COVID Resiliency funded initiative.