Equity and Positionality Statement 

We work on an array of projects that each center a strengths-based, anti-oppressive, trauma-informed approach rooted in Positive Youth Development. We uplift youth voice, center equity and practice cultural humility in every aspect of our work as we know that youth are the experts in their own lived experiences, and thus a vital part of any solution constructed to provide them with resources and guidance aimed to improve their health and well being.

Recognizing our Positionality and Historic and Current Role in Perpetuating Trauma and Oppression

Our team is based at the University of Minnesota, a land-grant institution located on the traditional, ancestral and contemporary lands of Indigenous peoples. We recognize that the University has a history of perpetuating trauma in our surrounding communities that has led to harm in community relationships and rightful mistrust. 


This project is also based at the University of Minnesota’s Division of General Pediatrics and Adolescent Health at the University of Minnesota School of Medicine. Medical schools and the practice of medicine are institutions that have histories of racism, homophobia, sexism and unequal power.  Both the University of Minnesota as a whole and medical schools more specifically are institutions that come with their own history of causing harm within communities, such as extractive techniques that further institutional momentum versus community gains, and for individuals. 


We also recognize that the very systems across sectors represented on this team, including healthcare, public health, and housing systems, though they aim to serve young people, have perpetuated harm to historically marginalized young people, including BIPOC youth, LBGTQ+ youth, and youth experiencing homelessness and have the potential to continue to do so.


Acknowledging the long history of marginalization and oppression that particularly targets youth experiencing homelessness, often at the hands of systems, our team will strive to center equity, uplift youth and community voices and intentionally practice cultural humility in every element of the work we do . We hope to use our collective wisdom and power to make actionable moves to dismantle systems of oppression. 

Commitment and Approach to Promoting Equity and Dismantling Systems of Oppression

To dismantle these inequities and ensure that we do not further perpetuate trauma at the hands of systems, our team is committed to the following approaches, guided by the 9 Evidence-based, Guiding Principles to Help Youth Overcome Homelessness, which were developed, in collaboration with multiple community-based youth-serving agencies, by the Homeless Youth Collaborative for Developmental Evaluation. We aim to apply the 9 Guiding Principles in all elements of our work by framing them in our methods to partners, utilizing them in our interview and focus group scripts, stating our usage of them to youth, and holding each other accountable to working within their framework. 

 

Recognizing that most youth experiencing homelessness have experienced trauma, often at the hands of the very systems we represent, we will commit to using trauma-informed practices and approaches in every phase of this work.

Individual Positionality Statements

Janna Gewirtz O’Brien, MD, MPH, Project Lead

Janna [she/her] is the Principal Investigator of the Youth Health and Housing Lab. She is a cis-gendered, secular Jewish, thin-bodied,  white woman born and raised on Long Island in New York without lived experiences of homelessness or housing instability. Her family is primarily of European descent and came to the U.S. fleeing religious persecution. After attending college and medical school at the University of Rochester in Rochester, NY, she moved to Minnesota to pursue residency in pediatrics at the Mayo Clinic. She now lives with her partner and daughter on Dakota land, commonly known as Southwest Minneapolis, MN. She is a board-certified pediatrician and adolescent medicine physician at the University of Minnesota, who provides healthcare to adolescents and young adults at Hennepin Healthcare and at The Bridge for Youth in Minneapolis. She also completed her Masters in Public Health at the University of Minnesota in Public Health Administration and Policy. Her clinical work, research and advocacy focus on advancing health equity among youth experiencing homelessness. She works at the intersection of housing and health to facilitate multi--sector collaboration, dismantle systems of oppression, and center youth voices in the heart of systems that are meant to serve them, drawing on the tenets of community-based participatory research and youth-participatory action research. Her work is grounded in frameworks of positive youth development and trauma-informed practice. . She originally came to this work in 2013, while working in a school-based health center with many youth who were unstably housed. There, she met remarkably resilient young people who faced adversity often at the very systems that were meant to serve them. Janna also engages in activism as the Treasurer of the Executive Board of the Minnesota Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the leader of the Youth Experiencing Homelessness Special Interest Group of the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine, and in partnership with several local reproductive justice organizations.


Meghan Ford, Program Manager, MPH

Meghan [she/her] is a cisgender, white, able-bodied woman. She grew up in Memphis, TN and Madison, WI and has lived in Missouri, North Carolina, and Texas. She currently resides in Minneapolis, MN on the land of the Dakota people. She does not have any lived experience with housing instability but has faced patriarchal and heteronormative rooted discrimination while receiving healthcare. These experiences, the high percentage of LBGTQ+ youth who experience housing instability, and her previous work at a service and cultural exchange-based youth leadership organization drew her to the work the Lab does. She believes that youth know best what they need and enjoys working with them on innovative solutions to important issues. Meghan aims to utilize her skills and experiences to further work that centers patient experiences and voices as a tool for quality and systems improvement, and to increase access to and utilization of care, specifically for minority populations. The work the Lab does aligns with these goals, and she appreciates the continued opportunity that being part of the team provides her to learn from her colleagues and community and youth partners about how she can better center marginalized voices and utilize health equity and anti-racist frameworks in healthcare and public health practice. 


Brandon Balma, Research Assistant; NRS Project Assistant

Brandon [he/him] is a genderfluid, queer, able-bodied, Italian American eldest brother of 4 boys. He was born in Ft Myers, Florida on the land of the Calusa tribe, where his family still resides. He currently resides in Minneapolis, MN on the land of the Dakota people. Brandon has experienced housing insecurity as a result of his queer identity, and it is the experiences from this period of his adolescence that humble and drive him in his current and future work. Brandon is a recent graduate in political science from the University of Minnesota: Twin Cities. Throughout his education and career, he strives to substantively represent the interests of his communities so he can serve as a positive representation for those who share his own queer identity. He believes in strengthening partnerships and collaboration in the multi sectors of health and wellbeing for youth, and seeks to do so in a trauma-informed, anti-oppressive, community-centered approach. 


Zeinab Mohamud, Research Assistant, RWJF Project

Zeinab [she/her] is a cisgender, able-bodied Muslim Somali American black woman who was born and raised in the Twin Cities on the land of the Dakota people. She has not had any lived experience of housing instability or homelessness. She is passionate about this work due to the increased forced displacement faced by refugees and historically marginalized communities due to multi-sector systemic and institutionalized barriers. Zeinab is a graduate of the University of Minnesota Twin Cities with a major in Biology, Society, and Environment and minors in public health and sociology. She hopes to continue her education after her undergraduate career with a focus in healthcare, health advocacy, human rights, and community engagement. She is passionate about the health and wellbeing of youth, particularly those who have been subjected to marginalization, and is excited to learn how to best serve and cultivate relationships with youth in trauma-informed, anti-oppressive, community-centered ways while keeping their voices and experiences at the center of her work. Due to her experience working primarily with youth from underserved and underrepresented communities, she found passion and joy in working alongside them to create change, advance health, and break through barriers.


Samantha LeBouef, PhD, Postdoctoral Fellow

Samantha [she/her] is a cisgender, able-bodied, queer, white woman. She is a first generation college student and Ronald E. McNair Alumna. She is originally from Louisiana. She currently resides in Minneapolis, MN on the land of the Dakota people. She does not have any lived experience with homelessness or housing instability. She attended Louisiana State University and earned a BS in Psychology. She then moved to Minnesota and earned her MA and PhD in Family Social Science. She is a current postdoctoral fellow in the Leadership Education in Adolescent Health Program in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Minnesota. Her research focuses on the experiences and implications of family support for adolescent and emerging adult success and well-being. This research aligns with the Youth Health and Housing Lab's holistic focus offering a crucial lens into the role of familial relationships through a more comprehensive view of support systems.


Alexis Chan, Medical Student Research Assistant

Alexis [she/her] is a cisgender, Asian-American, able-bodied woman. She grew up in Denver, Colorado and now lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on the land of the Dakota people. She does not have any lived experience of housing instability. She is currently a first-year medical student at the University of Minnesota Medical School Twin Cities. She received her Bachelor’s in Chemistry from Carleton College. After graduating, she worked as a research assistant at Emory University in Atlanta then moved back to the cities to work as a medical assistant in a clinic that primarily served minority communities. During this time, she also worked with shelters Twin Cities and Atlanta to provide child care while parents used the time to work or attend workshops. While working with YHHL, she hopes to strengthen these connections and continue to advocate for the health and wellbeing of youth using trauma-informed, anti-oppressive, and community-centered methods.


Casey Hokanson, Medical Student Research Assistant

Casey [he/him] is a white, cisgender, able-bodied person. He grew up in Shakopee, MN and now lives in Minneapolis, MN, on the land of the Dakota people. He has no lived experience of housing insecurity. Casey majored in human physiology and minored in developmental psychology at the University of Minnesota, where he now attends medical school. Throughout his time as a student, he has worked with numerous local youth and adolescent-serving community organizations including ULink, Quincy House, Kesem, Camp Kici Yapi, M Health Fairview Masonic Children’s Hospital, and the University YMCA. These formative experiences have solidified a desire to continue working with the resilient, creative, thoughtful, inspiring youth in this community for the rest of his career! In YHHL, he is excited to strengthen previous partnerships and embrace new engagement opportunities to support the holistic well-being of youth who have been marginalized in his community through a trauma-informed, anti-oppressive, and community-centered lens.


Wren Krahl, Medical Student Research Assistant

Wren [they/them] is a white, able-bodied, queer, trans and non-binary person. They do not have any lived experience of housing instability or homelessness. They grew up in the Twin Cities, on the land of the Dakota people. Wren received their Bachelor of Arts in Neurobiology and Spanish at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After graduating, they had two gap years full of experiences centering around direct patient care and education–specifically teaching English as a Second Language for children and adolescents. They are currently a first-year medical student at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities and have plans to pursue a Masters in Public Health during their time in medical school to more equitably serve their patients and integrate social justice into their clinical practice. Through working at YHHL, they are excited to learn how to center and uplift the voices of youth in advocacy and research efforts to improve health systems meant to serve youth. They are also excited to strengthen their own advocacy skills in a trauma-informed, anti-oppressive, community-centered way.


André  Robinson, Public Health Student Research Assistant 

André [he/him] is a cisgender, able-bodied, Brazilian-American man. He was born in Richfield, MN and grew up in both Orlando, FL and Minneapolis, MN. He now lives in Saint Paul, MN on the land of the Dakota people. He has not had lived experience in housing instability or homelessness. He is currently a Master of Public Health student in the Public Health Administration and Policy program. He received his bachelor degree with a dual-major in Neuroscience and Genetics, Cell Biology & Development (GCD) from the University of Minnesota, where he first discovered his interest in the substance use field. He currently studies immunotherapy in a biomedical research lab at the Masonic Cancer Center, and is also a member of the Minneapolis Public Health Advisory Committee. He is passionate about topics including housing and substance use, and is excited about tying these topics together in a way that centers youth through his work at YHHL.


This positionality statement was developed with contributions from previous members of our team.