About S.H.E. Circle: Advisory Committee

S.H.E. Circle National Advisory Committee

S.H.E. Circle National Advisory Committee
2003 Annual Meeting

The National Advisory Committee for S.H.E. Circle is made up of African-American lesbian physicians, researchers, activists, alternative health specialists, and straight allies. The committee meets annually in Washington, D.C. and quarterly by phone to discuss the direction of program activities. Each member serves are renewable two year commitment to the program. If you are interested in applying to be on our National Advisory Committee please contact us.

Adé Aboussena
Journalist
A talented writer and journalist, Adé Aboussena is published in several weekly and monthly journals including Women in the Life magazine, The Washington Blade, and Lesbian World Newspaper. Adé’s personal and professional goals encompass forging, nurturing, and sustaining personally transformative communities of women by generating bonds of personal friendship, support, and sisterhood around communal activities. Adé is trained at Level I in Reiki, and hopes to continue to share this healing energy in the community.

Martina Barnes, MHS
Deputy Director
Institute for Behavioral Change and Research (IBCR)
Martina holds a masters of Human Services degree from Lincoln University. As a Licensed Clinical Alcohol and Drug Counselor she provides group therapy services to local outpatient and residential drug treatment programs. She also works as a consultant in the field of substance abuse treatment and prevention. Martina is committed to helping those persons who are tripled diagnosed (HIV/AIDS, substance abuse, and mental health) maintain a rewarding quality of life.

Pamela Freeman, LCSW
Temple University
Pamela serves as the Coordinator of the Sexual Assault Education Program at Temple University. In addition, she has a private practice in the Philadelphia area where she specializes in working with trauma survivors, people of color, couples and families. Recently she initiated a campus based eating disorders support group for African American college aged women. As a psychotherapist and long time social activist in Philadelphia She is the co-director of the Playback for Change theatre company, and a graduate of the School of Playback Theatre.

Marilyn LuAnna Hughes Gaston, MD
Former Assistant Surgeon General and
Director, Bureau Primary Health Care
Co-director, Gaston & Porter Health Improvement Center
Dr. Gaston has committed her career to improving the health and wellness of everyone in our Nation – but especially women and children in general and African-American women and children in particular. As former Assistant General and director of the Bureau of Primary Health Care, she commanded a budget exceeding 5 billion dollars to provide quality health care to underserved, uninsured, disadvantaged, poor, minority, and high risk populations across the country. Her awards are numerous and she has most recently written a book: Prime Time: The African American Woman’s Guide to Midlife Health and Wellness.

Vicki Harris
Activist
Over the past ten years, Ms. Harris has been involved with women’s health issues starting with the Whitman Walker Clinic as a volunteer. She is also the founder and president of Sophisticated Ladies Productions, Inc. which is a special event organization providing safe environments for women to connect and party. Each year, this organization donates thousands of dollars to black gay pride efforts. In 1996, Ms. Harris received an award for outstanding work in the lesbian community from the Black Lesbian and Gay Pride Committee. Ms. Harris is also a member of the Mautner Project Board of Directors.

Georgette Howell, MS, RD, LDN
Assistant Professor
Immaculate University
College of Graduate Studies
Georgette Howell is a licensed, registered dietitian, currently practicing in the state of PA. She earned her Masters of Science degree at Columbia University, Teachers College in Nutrition and Education in New York City. Ms. Howell currently holds a full-time faculty position as Assistant Professor in the College of Graduate Studies at Immaculata University and has recently become affiliated with the Renfrew Center for Eating Disorders as a consulting dietitian. Georgette has been actively involved in community nutrition over the years. She has presented at several conferences and workshops in New York and plans to continue to participate in similar activities in her new home state. Georgette is a member of the American Dietetic Association, the Pennsylvania Dietetic Association, and the Society for Nutrition Education and Health Behavior as well as the American Association for University Professors. As a dietitian and college professor, she has long held the goal to serve as a role model and to recruit minority students into the field of dietetics

Denise M. Hyater, MA, CHES
Senior Vice President for External Marketing and Corporate Communications
American Cancer Society
Denise Hyater brings many years of healthcare, social marketing and diverse outreach program experience to the field of health communications and marketing. Currently, Ms. Hyater serves as Senior Vice President for External Marketing and Corporate Communications American Cancer Society where she manages the strategic implementation and operation of the South Atlantic Division’s communications and outreach efforts. Before joining the American Cancer Society, Ms. Hyater served as the Senior Vice President for Women’s Health at Ketchum, Public Relations, where she managed the Women’s Health Care practice, provided strategic insight on national celebrity driven consumer education programs and guided marketing campaigns for the women’s healthcare and marketing division of a major pharmaceutical company.

Min. Janyce L. Jackson
Executive Director LIUFC HIV/AIDS Prevention
Minister Jackson’s strong desire to give back to her community led her to retire from the NYPD in 2002, to work full time in LITUFC HIV Prevention program. She is currently the Executive Director of LITUFC HIV/AIDS Prevention and Care Services Program while she continues to serve at Liberation In Truth Unity Fellowship Church on the liturgical staff. She also serves as a board member of the Newark Pride Alliance, and is a member of the New Jersey Coalition of AIDS Service Providers. Personally touched by cancer when her mother died from lung cancer in 1995, when her partner was diagnosed with breast cancer in the summer of 2001, and by the many women that she comes into contact with daily, she wants to do her part in helping African-American women learn more about how to incorporate healthier living in their busy lives.

Rev. D. Abena McCray
Environmentalist, Activist
Reverend McCray has been an activist in the DC Metropolitan area since her arrival in 1972. She served as a fundraiser for the both the National Organization of Women and the campaign of Councilman Harold Brazil. She served on the board of Directors with DC Black Gay and Lesbian Pride Inc. for three years and presently serves as Vice Chair of the Executive Committee for the Mautner Project's National Board of Directors. Rev. McCray retired from the North-east-Midwest Institute, an environmental think-tank on Capitol Hill in December of 2002 to serve as pastor of the Unity Fellowship Church Washington, DC full time.

Monique Meadows
Development Director
National Youth Advocacy Coalition
Monique Meadows currently serves as the Director of Development for the National Youth Advocacy Coalition. Prior to that position, she was on staff at the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force where she worked as the Membership Director. Monique received her B.A. in Political Science from Illinois Wesleyan University in 1993 and is now a student at the National Spiritual Science Center in Washington, DC. She is the co-founder of Living Large, a health and wellness support group for lesbians and bisexual women of size, a Reiki practitioner, and student of massage therapy and aromatherapy.

Ngozi Messam
Horizontes Field Manager
LLEGÓ – The National Latina/o Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Organization
Ngozi Andrade Messam is the Community Relations Field Manager for LLEGÓ’s Horizontes program, which aims to build HIV prevention leadership skills among and those who serve Latino men who have sex with men (MSM). She is the daughter of Jamaican immigrants and grew up in a predominantly African-American and Latina/o community in Plainfield, New Jersey. Ngozi has extensive (about 15 years) experience coordinating community programs and service projects on a grassroots level with diverse populations. In addition, she is a former fitness professional, nationally ranked athlete and certified personal trainer. Ngozi continues to enjoy exchanging encouragement with others around wellness.

Nancy Norman, MD, MPH
Director Women’s Health
Fenway Community Health Center
Dr. Norman is an internist and the Director of Women's Health at the Fenway Community Health Center in Boston. Her areas of expertise include issues related to caring for gay patients in the medical setting and training on gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered health issues. She is a native Bostonian committed to eliminating racial and ethnic disparities in health care, especially for lesbian minority women. Dr. Norman serves on numerous boards including the LGBT Health Channel, Harvard Medical School Center of Excellence in Women’s Health and holds a faculty position at Harvard Medical School

Malika Saada Saar, JD
Executive Director The Rebecca Project for Human Rights
Malika Saada Saar is the executive director of the Rebecca Project for Human Rights, a national legal and advocacy organization for low-income families struggling with the intersecting issues of economic marginality, substance abuse, access to treatment, and the criminal justice system. Ms. Saada Saar is the former founder and director of Family Rights and Dignity, a Bay Area-based civil rights organization for homeless families.

Shakira Washington, MPH
Shakira Washington has a BS from San Francisco State university in Urban Studies with an emphasis in Public Policy and MPA Degree from NYU in Public Administration with an emphasis in Public Policy. She has been an out lesbian for almost 20 years and some of her work has included: 1 – co-founder of Sister to Sister – a rap group for black women at SF State university – 2 – the Nia Collective (weekend retreat for AFAM lesbians – 3 – Activist with RAW – Roots Against War; Ashe, a lesbian newsletter in the Bay Area; The Audre Lorde Project, a multi-cultural LGBT organization in New York City; Women in the Life; Amethyst & Indigo, Inc. ~ Sistah Summerfest, a weekend retreat for women of color. Most of her work experience has been as an advocate for financially less fortunate communities of color and research that has primarily focused on HIV/AIDS and cancer education and awareness. She is also an amazing photographer. As the former Program Manager and Researcher for the Georgetown University Medical Center – Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Control Program, she conducted Qualitative and Quantitave research by interviewing Black women with abnormal mammograms about their follow-up test patterns. Additionally, she was critical in the opening of the Avon clinical capitol breast care center and the CALB study on Cancer and Leukemia Group B – chemotherapy decisions and the elderly.