Biography
Originally from Puerto Rico, Andy has over 20 years of experience in community development and resilience and has worked in over 20 countries. He started out as an outreach worker for migrant farmworkers in rural north Florida before joining the Florida Department of Health providing Training and Program Development to increase minority access for HIV Counseling and Testing. Andy began working internationally in 2003, when he joined the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors in Washington, D.C. Two years later, an opportunity in India took him to Kolkata and Mumbai, where he managed a national network of sexual minority community-based organizations. In 2007, he moved again, this time to London to work with Interact Worldwide managing a portfolio of HIV, Sexual & Reproductive Health, and Community Health projects in South Asia. He later joined CARE International to provide technical support on addressing HIV issues within Humanitarian, Conflict, Governance, and Private Sector Engagement programs, and he served on the executive committee of the UK Consortium on AIDS and International Development, as well as the Interagency Standing Committee Task Force on HIV in Emergencies. Before coming to Tulane to pursue a doctorate degree in the interdisciplinary City Culture, and Community Program, Andy worked with the International Services Division of the American Red Cross as a Senior Advisor. Through this work, he became involved in resilience building programs focusing on the development of approaches to address health and community resilience; including leading in the development of assessment processes to support community resilience building. Andy’s doctoral work focuses on the intersection between sense of community, personal support networks, and group-level resilience, with a special focus on the characteristics of resilience of marginalized groups.
