The APPAM Equity & Inclusion Young Professional Fellowship will support young professionals from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds at the APPAM Fall Research Conference. Applicants must be within five years of receiving their master's or PhD Degrees. The recipients will be recognized for their accomplishments and will also have opportunities to formally network with each other, Student Equity and Inclusion Fellowship Recipients and with members of the Policy Council and Diversity Committee. They will also have many opportunities to informally network with other students and professionals during the Annual Fall Research Conference.
Congratulations to the 2024 Equity & Inclusion Fellowship recipients!
Aisha Balogun, Housing Solutions Lab at NYU Furman Center
Ratna Dougherty, School of Public Affairs at the University of South Florida
Elizabeth (Nikki) Miller, NYU Furman Center
Victor St. John, John Glenn College of Public Affairs at The Ohio State University
Cesar Vargas Nunez, Claremont McKenna College
Aisha Balogun
Aisha Balogun is the Special Projects Associate with the Housing Solutions Lab at the NYU Furman Center. In her role, she collaborates with a small team to support policy research and create direct-to-practitioner resources that address the intersections between housing affordability and other key considerations, including climate change, citizens returning from jails and prisons, and community engagement. Prior to her time with the Housing Solutions Lab, Aisha worked with the Moving Forward Network to bolster community-led advocacy by creating educational materials on clean energy policy for environmental justice groups. Motivated by her work with grassroots groups and larger social organizations, Aisha strives to bridge the gap between institutions and communities to co-create solutions for housing affordability and urban inequality. Aisha holds a Master of Urban Planning from the NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and a dual B.S./B.A. in Engineering (Architectural Design) and Sociology from Stanford University.
Ratna Dougherty
Ratna Dougherty is an Assistant Professor at the School of Public Affairs at the University of South Florida. Her research primarily focuses on the interorganizational networks’ coordination in policy and practice during disaster response. She is also interested in social networks, local government leadership, and emergency management issues that impact public policy. She has published in journals such as Public Administration Quarterly, International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, Journal of Public Affairs Education and Natural Hazards. She is an International City/County Management Association (ICMA) Senior Management Fellow (2016-2018), American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) Founders Fellow (2023), and an Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management (APPAM) Equity and Inclusion Fellow (2024). Her work has been supported by the USF Humanities Institute, as well as the Natural Hazards Center Quick Response Research. She serves on boards for both professional and academic associations, with the belief that all research should be informed by the needs in practice.
Elizabeth (Nikki) Miller
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Elizabeth (Nikki) Miller is the Data Management Associate at the NYU Furman Center. She holds a master's in public administration from NYU Wagner where she specialized in Policy. At Wagner, Nikki worked part-time as a graduate research assistant on the Furman Center’s data team. Prior to Wagner, Nikki served as an AmeriCorps math fellow assisting middle schoolers at Great Oaks Charter School (GONYC). Her interests include affordable housing, zoning, sustainable development, and the usage of data analysis in research. Nikki graduated from the University of Connecticut in 2020 with a BA in Economics.
Victor St. John
Victor St. John is a tenure-track Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University within the John Glenn College of Public Affairs and a faculty affiliate of OSU’s Criminal Justice Research Center. Additionally, Victor is a Research Scientist at Child Trends, where he leads evaluations and provides technical assistance. He earned a Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from John Jay College of Criminal Justice | CUNY Graduate Center, and a B.S. in Criminology from SUNY Old Westbury.
Victor's professional journey in criminal justice began in 2010, including roles such as Director of Research and Analysis for the NYC Board of Correction and supervisor of youth detention facilities under the NYC Close to Home Initiative. His research focuses on reducing the social and racial harm associated with the excessive use of the criminal justice system. He employs mixed-methods and interdisciplinary approaches to study mass criminalization, social inequities, and mitigation strategies that can inform practice and policy.
Victor's research has appeared in esteemed journals and has received publication awards from the American Society of Criminology and the Time-sharing Experiments for the Social Sciences. His work has also been supported by external funders, including federal agencies such as the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Cesar Vargas Nunez
Cesar Vargas Nunez is an assistant professor of government at Claremont McKenna College. His research sits at the intersection of political science, public health, and sociology. Specifically, Cesar focuses on understanding the consequences of healthcare exclusion and the factors that shape public attitudes toward providing welfare to undocumented immigrants. His research has been generously funded by the National Academies of Science Engineering and Medicine (Ford Dissertation Fellowship), National Institutes of Health (NIH) Spectrum Grant, NIH Diversity Supplement Postdoctoral Award, and Stanford University's Center for American Democracy (SCAD) and Institute for Research in the Social Sciences (IRiSS).
Cesar obtained his PhD in Political Science from Stanford University and BA from Pitzer College.