NOTE: This episode was recorded on January 9th, 2020. Our guest for this special episode during Hispanic Heritage Month is José López – a prominent community leader and Executive Director of The Puerto Rican Cultural Center in Chicago, which he co-founded in 1973. He has written extensively on the political and social reality of Puerto […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 9: José López on Humboldt Park, Puerto Rican Culture & Identity in Chicago

NOTE: This episode was recorded in October 2019.   The SkinnyTrees podcast team took a field trip to an urban farm on Chicago’s south side. Founded in 2017, the Urban Growers Collective (UGC) aims to address the inequities and structural racism that exist in the food system and in underserved communities. Their vision is to […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 8: Food Access & Justice in Chicago featuring the Urban Growers Collective

Note: This episode was recorded on March 12, 2020, just days before the Governor of Illinois instituted a stay-at-home order due to the coronavirus outbreak.   In this episode we connected with Kimberly Soenen (short bio below) to discuss the importance of language in health and her ongoing art exhibit “SOME PEOPLE” (Every)Body. The ongoing […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 7: “SOME PEOPLE” (Every)Body. Art, Health & Language with Kimberly J. Soenen

In this episode we sit with Dr. Fernando De Maio and Dr. Raj Shah. Together they are co-directors of the Center for Community Health Equity — a collaboration between DePaul and Rush University — founded in 2015. They are also co-editors of “Community Health Equity: A Chicago Reader” — released in April 2019. We discuss […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 6: “Community Health Equity: A Chicago Reader” with Raj Shah, MD & Fernando De Maio, PhD

Join us as we talk about the inequities surrounding gun violence with our Strategic Operations Director Samantha Alonis as she leads the discussion with Noam Ostrander (DePaul University) and Terry Williams (UIC) from the Chicago Gun Violence Research Collaborative, with special guest Valerie Burgest from the Illinois Chapter of Moms Demand Action. We cover how […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 5: Preventing Gun Violence in Chicago ft. Noam Ostrander, Terry Williams & Valerie Burgest

In this episode, we sat down with Dr. Clyde Yancy — Vice Dean for Diversity & Inclusion and Chief of Cardiology in the Department of Medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine (NUFSM). In our discussion we covered the dangers of implicit bias in healthcare, addressing inequities in academic medical institutions, and how Dr. […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 4: Straight Talk about Biases in Healthcare with Dr. Clyde Yancy

Join us in this special episode featuring the Chicago Cancer Health Equity Collaborative Research Fellows Program 2019 cohort. This program brings undergrad and postbac students together in preparation for careers in social, behavioral, and biomedical research and in health care. They share with us their experiences, highlights and “aha” moments from this summer and how […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 3: Reflecting on the ChicagoCHEC Research Fellows Program Summer 2019

In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Julie Morita, former Commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health and currently the Executive Vice President at the RWJF (Robert Wood Johnson Foundation)”overseeing all programming, policy, research, and communications activities in support of its vision of building a Culture of Health in America in which everyone […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 2: Dr. Julie Morita fmr. Commissioner of Chicago Dept. of Public Health & Current EVP at RWJF

Welcome back! SkinnyTrees is happy to return with its second season. In this first episode of season two we bring back Dr. Melissa Simon to discuss what we have been up to since you last heard from us. Dr. Simon introduces an exciting new center launched this year — the Center for Health Equity Transformation […]

Read More Season 2, Episode 1: Dr. Melissa Simon Re-Introduction & the new CHET (Center for Health Equity Transformation)

Access Living on the triumphs and tribulations for people living with disabilities

Read More EPISODE 3 | Nothing about US, without US – Conversations with Access Living, Chicago’s Leading Change Agent for People with Disabilities