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Lender Center Student Fellows Named, Will Work on Public Health Research Project

November 4, 2024

SU News

Five students will soon begin a two-year research project examining the potential social justice and public health impacts of living in neighborhoods that have experienced the historical discriminatory practice of redlining. That is a practice where, for decades, financial institutions designated certain neighborhoods—primarily Black ones—as poor credit risks, making it difficult for residents there to own homes or improve their properties.

Lender Center Fellows 2024-26

The students, recently named 2024-26 Lender Center for Social Justice student fellows, will work with Miriam Mutambudzi, assistant professor of public health in the Falk College of Sport and Human Dynamics, who is the 2024-26 Lender Center faculty fellow.

Among those selected are Maxwell students Tommy DaSilva ’26, a policy studies and citizenship and civic engagement major, and Sabrina Lussier ’26, a triple major in geography, citizenship and civic engagement, and environmental sustainability and policy. 

DaSilva, from Newark, Delaware, is interested in promoting health equity through health promotion policies and community-based practices. On campus, he has been involved in the Student Association of Public Health Education and Connect 315. In the community, DaSilva has interned with the YWCA of Syracuse and Onondaga County, ACR Health and the City of Syracuse Department of Neighborhood and Business Development.

Lussier, from the Washington, D.C., area, is an honors student and Maxwell Leadership Scholar. She is a STOP Bias peer educator, a resident advisor for the MORE in Leadership Living Learning Community and has spent the past year working for the Syracuse Neighborhood and Business Development Office.

Her research and academic interests focus on how urban planning intersects with community engagement, social justice and sustainability. Her citizenship capstone and honors thesis looks at the effect of freeway demolition on marginalized communities, focusing on Syracuse’s East Adams neighborhood near I-81 in the historic 15th ward.

Read the full article via the SU News website.

By Diane Stirling


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