WASHINGTON, D.C., – The Society for Public Health Education (SOPHE) is proud to announce that Dr. Chandra Ford will be awarded the Dorothy Nyswander Health Equity Award during the 2025 SOPHE Annual Conference in Long Beach, April 16–18.
“It has been difficult to come up with words that fully capture how it feels to receive this award,” said Ford. “To receive the Dorothy B. Nyswander Award from SOPHE truly feels humbling. In many ways, Dr. Nyswander was a pioneer… I imagine her to be inventive, persistent, and perpetually optimistic—ever pursuing solutions to new challenges as they arise.”
This award recognizes individuals or groups who embody and promote health equity through research, practice, and/or teaching. Dr. Ford’s career exemplifies this mission through her scholarly contributions, advocacy, and commitment to addressing systemic injustices in health care and education.
Dr. Chandra Ford is Professor of Behavioral, Social and Health Education Sciences in the Rollins School of Public Health and of African American Studies at Emory University. Prior to joining Emory, she founded the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice and Health, which relocated with her to Atlanta in 2023. Dr. Ford is the lead editor of Racism: Science & Tools for the Public Health Professional (APHA Press, 2019), which was named an Outstanding Academic Title by the American Library Association. She earned her doctorate in Health Behavior from the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health and completed postdoctoral fellowships in Social Medicine at UNC and Epidemiology at Columbia University.
Her expertise includes the conceptualization and measurement of race, ethnicity, and racism; health equity applications of Critical Race Theory; and the health and healthcare implications of racism. Much of her work highlights the systemic factors that shape health disparities and empowers future health educators to integrate equity-driven approaches in their research and practice.
“In addition to feeling tremendous humility, I also feel a great responsibility to live up to the high standard Dr. Nyswander set,” said Ford. “She was concerned that our work reflects the highest quality science. This award is inspiring—it motivates me to double down on advancing ‘optimal health for all’ at a time when political retrenchment is making it difficult or risky to do so.”
Ford emphasizes that health equity is foundational to public health. “If public health is ‘optimal health for all,’ then equity is a core part of public health. Public health cannot be achieved without advancing health equity,” she explained. “Rather than thinking of health equity as a state to be achieved, I think of it as the process of making conditions fair and just. From just, fair processes, sustained equity in outcomes will naturally occur.”
Reflecting on the current moment in public health, Ford added, “The last five years, the value that public health—especially health education—adds to our society has become increasingly apparent and, at the same time, increasingly contested. This is a consequential moment for our field, our profession, our nation and the world. Health education has strategies that can have real impacts in this context.”
SOPHE will present all awards and scholarships to public health professionals, health education researchers, faculty, programs, and practitioners at the 2025 SOPHE Annual Conference. These awards and scholarships recognize significant advancements in the profession of health education and health promotion and outstanding contributions of veterans and rising stars to improving the public’s health.
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About SOPHE
The Society for Public Health Education (SOPHE) is a nonprofit association that supports leaders in public health, health education, and promotion to advance healthy and equitable communities across the globe. SOPHE members work in health care settings, communities, organizations, schools, universities, worksites, and in local, state, and federal government agencies. For more information visit www.sophe.org.
