Executive Advisory Board
Board Member Bios Heading link
Tameeka Christian is a Program Officer with the J.B. and M.K. Pritzker Family Foundation working on The Pritzker Community Health Initiative. At the foundation, Tameeka leads the development of a multimillion-dollar portfolio focused on the intersection of health, housing and homelessness, as well as the criminal justice system. Under Tameeka’s guidance, the foundation has undertaken an ambitious goal to dramatically improve outcomes for individuals who cycle through emergency rooms, homelessness shelters, and jails. She has leveraged her skillset to create a vision that imagines systems of care collaborating to focus on the wellbeing of individuals, and in particular those who are most often ignored and marginalized. Tameeka brings the kind of community centered, collaborative, and innovative thinking to address some of the most pressing social challenges of our time.
Veronica Clarke serves as the President & CEO of TCA Health, Inc. NFP, a role she has held since 2006. TCA Health is a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) catering to a diverse patient community across the far Southside of Chicago. Under her leadership, TCA Health is embarking on a significant expansion into Northwest Indiana, broadening its reach and impact. In addition to her executive duties, Veronica holds the position of Vice Speaker of the House for the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC), where she also sits on the Executive Committee. Her commitment to the community extends further through her past roles as Board Chair of several nonprofits in the Chicagoland area.Veronica holds a Master of Science degree from Eastern Illinois University and is currently pursuing a PhD in Public Policy and Administration. She has augmented her academic pursuits with completion of the prestigious Johnson and Johnson/UCLA Healthcare Executive Program. Recognized for her outstanding contributions, Veronica was honored as one of Crain’s Chicago Business’ 2022 Notable Leaders in Community Development.
Dr. Lee Francis ’00 joined Erie Family Health Center in 1991 and has served as President and CEO since 2007. Dr. Francis is charged with enacting Erie’s strategic vision of serving as a national leader in the provision of community-based health care. Erie currently serves over 87,000 patients at 13 locations from North Lawndale, West Town and Humboldt Park, to Albany Park, Evanston-Skokie and Waukegan. Dr. Francis is a board-certified internist and cares for adult patients at Erie. He received his MPH (’00) and MD (’88) from UIC and is an associate professor of clinical medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, a fellow of the Leadership Greater Chicago Class of 2000 and is fluent in Spanish.
Dr. Wayne H. Giles (ex officio board member) is the Dean of the School of Public Health. He joined UIC after serving for 25 years as a leader at Centers for Disease Control and Prevention focused on chronic disease prevention and health promotion. Immediately before joining UIC he led the Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention where he oversaw initiatives to improve cardiovascular health by enhancing state and global activities focused on the prevention, treatment and control of heart disease and stroke. His past research and scientific work has included examining the prevalence of hypertension in Africa, studying racial differences in stroke incidence, and leading clinical trials evaluating the effectiveness of cholesterol-lowering agents.
Katherine Koo, BA in Public Health ’17, is a program manager at Rush University Medical Center focused on leveraging community-based health technology and data interoperability to address health disparities in long-covid and cardiometabolic disease. Her research interests include validation of medical devices for patient remote monitoring and risk-prediction modeling of social determinant of health needs, in efforts to eliminate the 16-year life-expectancy gap on Chicago’s South and West Sides. She is an adjunct lecturer at Rush University where she has taught the course Health Equity and New Models of Care and currently serves as co-chair of the UIC SPH Alumni Council. Katherine received her BAPH from UIC and MS-HSM from Rush University.
Jessica Lederhausen, MPH ’03, has always been entrepreneurial minded. At a young age, she launched herself into professional golf and continued her metamorphosis into various ventures. She is an accredited Dentist who challenged herself to reach patients through a research project looking at “Mobile Dental Care.” After moving to Chicago from Stockholm, she spent ten years in the lifestyle business, sharing her passion for healthy habits. In 2017, she committed herself to “Ideas Worth Spreading” by producing TEDxChicago until 2022, when she left to pursue her consulting business working with clients to understand the connectedness of oral and overall health. Above all else, Jessica prioritizes family and enjoys watching her four grandchildren flourish while always multi-tasking with hobbies such as playing golf, reading, baking, and knitting.
Suzet M. McKinney, DrPH ’09, currently serves as CEO and executive director of the Illinois Medical District, one of the largest urban medical districts in the United States that includes 560 acres of medical research facilities, labs, a biotech business incubator, universities, raw land development areas, four hospitals and more than 40 healthcare related facilities. She is the former deputy commissioner of the Bureau of Public Health Preparedness and Emergency Response at the Chicago Department of Public Health, where she oversaw the emergency preparedness efforts for the department and coordinated those efforts within the larger spectrum of the City of Chicago’s public safety activities, in addition to overseeing the department’s Division of Women and Children’s Health.
Dr. Marla Mendelson is the Medical Director of the Northwestern Adult Congenital Heart Center and the Center for Women’s Cardiovascular Health of the Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute. She founded both the Heart Disease and Pregnancy program and the Adult Congenital Heart Disease program over 25 years ago. She continues to direct the Northwestern Heart Disease and Pregnancy program. She is an associate professor of medicine and pediatrics at the Feinberg School of Medicine. Dr. Mendelson’s special interests include adults with congenital heart disease. She cares for women with pre-existing heart disease during pregnancy and those who develop heart disease during the course of a pregnancy. For women with congenital heart disease, she provides preconception planning, contraceptive counseling, and care of women through pregnancy working closely with the woman’s obstetrician. She has lectured locally, nationally and internationally on the subject and directs courses regarding the care of these unique patient populations. Dr. Mendelson was the co-director of the former Women’s Health Research Institute at Northwestern, which championed equity in health care research educating peers to the inherent bias in bench and clinical research against female subjects.
Robert Merrick, MD, MPH ’76, practiced pathology and was laboratory director and hospital epidemiologist at Blessing Hospital, Quincy, Illinois. He subsequently served as medical director quality and performance improvement for the Blessing Health System until retiring. He was medical director for the Adams County Health Department, a Baldridge Performance Excellence Examiner and on the faculty of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement.
Uche Onwuta, MPH ’97 is the director of the division of health protection at the Kane County Health Department. She leads a team of dedicated professionals in the areas of infectious diseases, environmental health and food safety. In her previous roles in her 22 years at the Kane County Health Department, she led efforts in epidemiology, community health assessment and planning, immunizations and opioid use disorder surveillance programs. Uche is an adjunct instructor at Benedictine University where she has taught courses in Community Health Analysis, Epidemiology, and Public Health Systems. She volunteers for several organizations including Destiny Global Foundation, a medical missions organization focusing on prevention, treatment, and management of Hypertension and Diabetes Mellitus amongst the medically underrepresented in Africa.
Clarita Santos ’96 (board chair) is the executive director of community health initiatives at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois. In this role, she oversees statewide community engagement, including the launch of the Blue Door Neighborhood Center, the company’s first community-based health and wellness center. For more than ten years, she has lead the allocation of grant funding to community partners to help increase access to care, improve population health and improve health equity among the uninsured and under-insured in Illinois. She earned her MPH in Health Policy and Administration from the UIC School of Public Health.
Stephanie D. Willding, MPA became the Chief Executive Officer of CommunityHealth, the nation’s largest free health center, in November 2019. Steph has committed her career to rebuilding systems that will engage and empower under-resourced communities to lead healthier lives. She has led initiatives at health centers across Chicago that have increased access to care, deepened service availability, and improved health outcomes. She holds a Master of Public Administration from the University of Illinois at Chicago. She was named Crain’s Business Chicago Top 40 Under 40 in 2022. Outside of her work in health justice, Steph’s passions include urban container gardening, Formula 1 racing, and running marathons.