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Healthcare Heroes award in the Collaboration in Health/Wellness category.
Through the program, launched in 2015, these organizations not only identify families in need of intervention for environmental health issues and educate them on lifestyle changes, but actually make the needed physical changes to their homes.
This is the kind of collaborative effort that not only brings about positive change within the community, but inspires individuals and groups to think about what else can be done, said Colleen Loveless, herself a Woman of Impact, who nominated Collins for the award this year.
“Jessica has made impactful contributions to the local and statewide community that have had positive ripple effects throughout the nation,” Loveless wrote. “She exemplifies spirit, service, compassion, and empathy for others, and exhibits a high sense of professionalism in everything she does.”
These traits, and especially her ability to
listen, learn, and then mobilize forces to combat health and wellness issues and build stronger neighborhoods, have made Collins a true Woman of Impact.
Healthy Attitude
Returning to her time at Wellesley, Collins said that, while history and the Kennedy years were — and still are — a fascination, volunteering, or giving back, was — and still is — a passion.
And it took her first to the Northwest and her work with those living with AIDS.
“It was still tearing communities apart at that time,” she said of the disease. “This was still before they developed the ‘cocktail,’ a blend of medications that really came through in the late ’90s. At that time, people were dying, and it was people across all socio-economic classes; it was a very eye-opening experience.”
So, too, was her time in West Africa and the tiny nation of Guinea-Bissau, where she worked at a health center in a small village of 1,700 people. Working with a midwife and a nurse, she provided lessons in health education. “I obviously learned 100% more than what I taught,” she recalled.
“From both of those experiences, I knew I wanted to be part of something that would allow people to be healthy,” she explained. “It just fit my groove.”
Jessica Collins has devoted her career to public health and addressing some of the larger health problems facing society.
Elaborating, she said she came to understand that she didn’t want to do this work one-on-one, but rather in a community-health setting, and with that goal in mind, she went about earning
a master’s degree in food policy and applied nutrition from the Friedman School of Nutrition and Policy at Tufts University.
With that degree, she took a job as project manager of the Institute for Community Health
in Cambridge, where she oversaw an overweight- prevention pilot study. Later, she served as project manager for Tufts’ “Shape Up Somerville: East Smart. Play Hard” study that received national recognition for reducing BMIz scores in high-risk third-grade students in Somerville Public Schools.
When she relocated with her family to Western Mass., she joined PHIWM as director of Special
CONGRATULATIONS
JESSICA COLLINS
Executive Director,
Public Health Institute
of Western MA
on receiving the
2021 Women of Impact Award.
Your leadership and many contributions to advocacy and improving public health in western Massachusetts are valued and appreciated.
Jessica Collins
On behalf of all the lives you have touched, thank you!
Women of BaystateHealth.org
CS13320
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Jessica Collins
We honor you as a Woman of Impact for your leadership and commitment to racial justice and health equity.
Thank you for working to ensure that all people have access to what they need to live a healthy life.
omen of From all your friends at
MPACT
PROGRAM OF BUSINESSWEST
PublicHealthWM.org
34 OCTOBER 27, 2021
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