Francesca Weaks
Faculty Researcher and Health Equity Fellow, Center for Health Equity
fweaks@umd.eduSPH Building, Suite 3302
Dr. Francesca Weaks, (DrPh, MS, MCHES) serves as a Assistant Research Scientist for the Center for Community Engagement, Environmental Justice, and Health (CEEJH) and the Maryland Center for Health Equity (MCHE) at University of Maryland School of Public Health, College Park. For both centers she oversees grant development, financial and standard operating procedures. Additionally, she serves as a lead researcher with a concentration on community based participatory research, racism, and integration of AI/ML technology with public health research. She is also the founder and principal of The Genevieve Strategies Group LLC, an organization that produces public health accountability and social determinants of health policy strategies, research, and programming methods for state and local communities.
Dr. Weaks’ areas of research examines the intersection of racism, health, civil rights law, and policy in community health development. As a researcher by training and a policy advocate and practitioner by experience, she is focused on advocating for equitable community health policies by addressing systematic racism and health disparities. She was recently awarded the National Minority Quality Forum’s 2023 40 under 40 Healthcare Leadership Award, in fall 2022 accepted to the National Institute of Health’s AIM- AHEAD Leadership Fellowship, and serves on the Milken Institute Health Equity Thought Advisory Panel.
Department Information
- Center for Health Equity
Prior to launching The Genevieve Strategies Group, Dr. Weaks’ conducted work at National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) where she served as the Health Policy and Research Manager. For over 10 years, she has been a community and social determinant of health researcher (SDH) and public health policy practitioner advocating for communities of color. With a background in health education and promotion, her passion lives in building healthy communities through addressing disproportionate conditions through education & promotion on an individual and community level behavior change, and speaking up on behalf of disadvantaged communities. As an operations guru she loves to strategize and implement sustainable resources and programs for black communities by partnering with grassroots organizations and training communities on how to advocate for effective community policies.
Over the past decade she has resided in Baltimore, Maryland but is a country girl at heart. Originally from NC, she graduated from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University with a Dual Bachelors of Science in Biology & Secondary Education with a minor in Chemistry. She holds a Dual Masters in Health Science with a concentration in Health Administration and Community Health from Towson University and holds her Doctorate in Public Health with a focus in Health Policy & Management from Morgan State University and is currently pursuing her Masters in Law with a focus at Texas A & M University.