O’Neill Receives Feingold Excellence in Diversity Award

Marie O'Neill, associate professor of environmental health sciences and epidemiology, was awarded the Eugene Feingold Excellence in Diversity Award. Her nomination received overwhelming support from students, faculty, and staff.

O'Neill's research often focuses on vulnerable populations. She works on vegetation and heat vulnerabilities in Detroit and air quality and birth outcomes in Mexico City. International funding organizations such as the Health Effects Institute cite O'Neill's scholarship as a model for furthering objectives of health equity.

O'Neill's research consistently brings together scholars, practitioners, and community partners to explore common issues. She employs community-based participatory research (CBPR) methods and is committed not only to publishing results but to translating and promoting findings into action. In 2009 she and her team published a prototype heat vulnerability map, a public health and urban planning tool that has spawned further research on the topic. She received NIH and more recently NSF funding to study heat, comfort, and health equity issues.

"Public health success depends on creating spaces for ideas to be freely shared among students, faculty, and members of communities that are most adversely affected by health challenges," said Sharon Kardia, senior associate dean for administration and professor of epidemiology, "and Professor O'Neill has worked tirelessly toward this goal."