Stories That Matter is a project made possible through funding from The Colorado Health Foundation. The Foundation hired learning consultants, Ross Strategic and Community-Driven Initiatives (CDI), to better understand the communities they support from the community members’ perspectives. Ross Strategic and Community Driven Initiatives worked with community members in four Coloradan counties to gather these stories. The stories community members produced are shared with the community on this site and through community partners.
Who We Are
Ross Strategic
Ross Strategic supports government, philanthropy, and non-governmental organizations to launch, improve, evaluate, and refine programs and collaborative initiatives that address public health, environmental, energy, and natural resource challenges.
Nandini Chaturvedula, Associate at Ross Strategic, works with philanthropy, non- profits, and universities on measurement, evaluation, and learning, strategic planning, and program development. Through experiences living and working in Portugal, India, and Brazil, she has developed a keen sense of cross-cultural competence and awareness that is woven through her work. Her recent projects have focused on public health, energy, transportation, and environmental initiatives, community resilience, urban opportunity and empowering marginalized communities to engage in policy advocacy. Nandini holds a Ph.D. from Columbia University.
Jessie B. Doody, Associate at Ross Strategic, supports public health organizations to develop, implement, or evaluate initiatives and programs that aim to improve health, adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change, and advance equitable solutions to these complex problems. In this work, Jessie helps clients articulate objectives, identify gaps and opportunities, set evidence-based strategic direction, and evaluate progress. She has also worked on food programs in Latin America and the Caribbean, supporting scaling and implementing resilient, sustainable national social protection programs and policies as mechanisms to promote food and nutrition security in the region. Jessie holds a dual BA in International Studies and Spanish from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas.
Jennifer Major, Principal at Ross Strategic, has worked in the public health and policy arena for 18 years, supporting federal and state government and not-for-profit organizations in a variety of capacities. She is a highly skilled evaluator, facilitator, researcher, and writer with extensive experience as a project leader in the areas of program design and implementation, collaborative methods, public health programs and policy, and environmental justice. She works on a variety of public health issues, including health disparities, injury and violence prevention, indoor air quality, affordable housing, and health impacts associated with climate change and equity. Jen holds a Master of Public Health degree from Yale University.
Petra Vallila-Buchman, Senior Associate at Ross Strategic, has more than ten years of experience working with stakeholders to implement policy, environmental, and system change to improve community health and reduce health inequities. She believes equity and social justice are an intrinsic part of the practice of public health. She has extensive experience conducting qualitative research and evaluation and enjoys knitting together data and stories into a cohesive narrative. Her work has included health, urban opportunity, climate resilience, development in rural communities and engaging residents as partners in neighborhood planning to increase access to healthy food, active transportation, and economic opportunity. Petra holds a Master of Public Health from Emory University.
Community-Driven Initiatives
Community-Driven Initiatives, based at The University of Texas at Austin Dell Medical School, is focused on incorporating community residents’ perspectives into understanding and addressing social, systemic, and structural barriers of health.
Marianna Espinoza, Learning and Evaluation Manager of CDI, has 15 years of experience in research and evaluation and has partnered with universities, government institutions and non-profit organizations in Texas, North Africa, Southeast Asia, Central America and the Caribbean. At CDI, she supports the learning activities associated with the implementation of place-based initiatives, including program development and planning, project evaluation, and quality improvement. Marianna believes that the community members are experts with invaluable lived experience and seeks to create space for shared decision making. Marianna earned a Master of Public Health from The George Washington University.
Lourdes J. Rodriguez, is the founder of CDI and a program officer for St. David’s Foundation. Through CDI, Dr. Rodriguez worked with community organizations to bring a variety of health-related resources and efforts for specific neighborhoods and communities, creating opportunities for residents and leaders of community-based organizations to participate in shared learning. As a public health practitioner, she collaborates, develops and evaluates initiatives to improve health with people most impacted by health inequities. Prior to founding CDI in 2016, Dr. Rodriguez was a Program Officer at the New York State Health Foundation, where she supported grantees in the Building Healthy Communities portfolio. Dr. Rodriguez holds a Master of Public Health from the University of Connecticut and a DrPH from Columbia University.