Episode for July 18, 2022
Dr Tracey Wilkinson and Jennifer Jones Austin Episode 646
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Dr. Tracey Wilkinson is an assistant professor of pediatrics. She graduated from Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in 2006 and completed her pediatric residency at Brown University/Hasbro Children’s Hospital in Providence, RI. After residency, she pursued additional training through the general pediatrics fellowship at Boston Medical Center/Boston University. As a fellow, she obtained her Masters in Public Health and began conducting research on availability and access to over-the-counter emergency contraception for adolescents. Her research was cited in the federal court case that ultimately removed age restrictions for emergency contraception nationally. After fellowship, she was faculty at Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles/University of Southern California where she was a primary care pediatrician for 3 years. In 2015 she accepted a position at Indiana University to return to a research career. Her research focuses on examining and developing interventions to improve young people’s access to reproductive health services from the perspective of a general pediatrician.
Jennifer Jones Austin, Esq. CEO and Executive Director, FPWAA fourth-generation leader of faith and social justice, Jennifer Jones Austin fights for equity. As CEO of the Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies (FPWA), an anti-poverty, policy and advocacy organization with 170 member agencies and faith partners, she has led and secured monumental changes in social policy to strengthen and empower the disenfranchised and marginalized. Jennifer brings to her work a profound understanding of the link between race, poverty, law and social policy in America, and the role religion plays.
Prior to joining FPWA, Ms. Jones Austin served as Senior Vice President of the United Way of New York City; the City of New York’s first Family Services Coordinator; Deputy Commissioner for the NYC Administration for Children’s Services; Civil Rights Deputy Bureau Chief for Attorney General Eliot Spitzer; and Vice President for LearnNow/Edison Schools, Inc.
Ms. Jones Austin chairs the NYC Racial Justice Commission, the first of its kind in the nation created to develop ballot proposals to revise the City’s charter to dismantle structural racism in government functions and ensure equity for Black, indigenous and other persons of color. She has chaired several other influential boards and commissions, including the Mayoral Transition for Bill de Blasio; the NYC Procurement Policy Board; the NYC Board of Correction, where she presided over the promulgation of rules to end solitary confinement; the NYS Supermarket Commission; and the Community Engagement for Brooklyn District Attorney Gonzalez’s Justice 2020 Initiative. She was a lead advisor for the NYPD Reform and Reinvention Collaborative, and a member of the statewide COVID-19 “Roll Up Your Sleeves” Task Force created to ensure vaccine information and equitable access in Black and Brown communities. She currently serves as Vice Chair of the Board of National Action Network; member of the Feerick Center for Social Justice Advisory Board; and member of the Center for Law, Brain and Behavior Advisory Board at Harvard University. She also is the scholar in residence at Nyack College and Alliance Theological Seminary Center for Racial Reconciliation (CRR).
Jennifer co-hosts WBLS’ “Open Line”, guest hosts weekly the nationally syndicated radio program, “Keep’n It Real with Rev. Al Sharpton”, and appears frequently on the cable show, “Brooklyn Savvy”. She is a returning guest and contributor on the “Karen Hunter Show”.
Jennifer Jones Austin is the author of Consider It Pure Joy. Described as “a story that if not lived would make for a great novel”, it is the harrowing account of her year-long battle with a sudden, life-threatening illness, and the power of faith and community to transform desperation into joy. She is the editor of God in The Ghetto: A Prophetic Word Revisited, the re-release of her father, William Augustus Jones Jr.’s seminal work deconstructing the “System” of racism, capitalism and militarism all working in concert to continually oppress people of color.
Jennifer is a graduate of the Fordham University School of Law, the New York University Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, and Rutgers University. A recipient of numerous awards and recognitions, including two honorary doctorates, she considers the four honors bestowed upon her by her three alma maters especially significant.
Jennifer has two children and resides in Brooklyn, New York with her husband.
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