Penny Rechkemmer: Building partnerships

Like others in the field, Penny Rechkemmer came to public health almost by accident, while finishing her master's degree in anthropology.

"I was looking for some way to apply anthropology to situations happening now," she remembers. "I happened upon public health. I didn't even know it existed."

After receiving her M.P.H. in 2000 in Public Health Administration and Policy, Rechkemmer decided to focus on environmental health.

"Environmental health seemed like the right fit for me," she says. "In my anthropology work in Nigeria, I would see the influence of the environment on public health."

Rechkemmer's professors and advisors encouraged her interests in international health and research. Her dissertation was on Indian women's respiratory health and their cooking fuels.

After getting her Ph.D. in 2004, she began a post-doc fellowship at Johns Hopkins where she merged environmental health science with community outreach. Too often, she explains, "people just go out and do public health, and the community is not really involved."

Rechkemmer builds partnerships.

"That way [the community members] get feedback, and you make sure they have a vested interest in the research," she says.

In 2006, Rechkemmer joined the U.S. Department of State.

(Updated: June 2009)