SIHI Fellowship Program 2026

The 2026 Fellows will engage in mentorship, peer learning, competency-based development, and the InnoBites video project. Through the program, fellows will strengthen their understanding of social innovation, connect with the broader SIHI network, and share practical lessons from their own communities and areas of work.

If you have questions about the program, email Yanqi Wang at yanqwang@unc.edu

Fellows

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Chris Wainwright is a PhD candidate and university associate lecturer, with a background in youth mental health, education, and public health. He works with batyr, a youth mental health organisation focused on prevention, stigma reduction, and lived experience storytelling. His research explores peer support and lived experience advocacy, with particular interest in how involvement in advocacy roles can improve well-being, empowerment, and educational and occupational engagement among young people. He is especially interested in how social innovation in health can move beyond traditional service models to amplify lived experience leadership and co-produced approaches. Through the SIHI Fellowship, he hopes to explore scalable, community-led models that strengthen youth mental health systems and improve access, equity, and early intervention.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Lived experience-led and co-produced youth mental health innovation, peer support systems, and scalable community-based interventions.

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Yewande O. Addie, PhD, MPH, is a health communication scholar and narrative strategist whose work examines how stories shape public understanding of health, risk, and equity, particularly in low- and middle-income contexts. A two-time Fulbright Scholar, she holds a PhD in Mass Communications, an MPH, and an MA in History. Her research and applied practice span global health communication, narrative change/storytelling strategy, and the role of emerging technologies in health, with prior experience as a CDC Health Communications Fellow, a strategic narrative researcher at RTI International, and a communications professional at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Across academic and practitioner settings, she works at the bridge between research and practice—translating complex findings into accessible, actionable tools, frameworks, and stories.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Yewande approaches narrative change as a form of social innovation: storytelling not just as dissemination, but as a site of intervention in how health problems are framed, solutions are imagined, and power circulates. She is especially interested in community-centered and co-created communication, narrative measurement, and the equity implications of AI-generated health messaging in global

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Jedidah Millapo is a Digital Health Learning Expert, Consultant, and Coach with over eight years of experience designing and facilitating large-scale training, capacity strengthening, and learning initiatives across the health sector. She has worked extensively with Ministries of Health and implementing partners to support digital health transformation, systems strengthening, and workforce development programs. Jedidah holds a Master’s degree in Development Studies and is passionate about human-centered learning, adaptive leadership, and innovation in health systems. Through the SIHI Fellowship, she hopes to deepen her engagement in social innovation research while strengthening her thought leadership in digital health learning and health systems transformation across Africa.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Exploration of how participatory learning, digital
innovation, and systems leadership can be leveraged to strengthen
community-centered health systems and improve sustainable
implementation outcomes in low-resource settings.

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Kulubya has over a decade of experience in youth empowerment and community development. With a Bachelor’s degree in Economics, Kulubya’s work bridges public health, youth leadership, advocacy, and economic empowerment. Kulubya is driven by the conviction that young people are not merely passive beneficiaries of development, but active architects of sustainable solutions. Kulubya has contributed to digital health initiatives including the Wekume SRHR App and the MomCare system.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Community-centered digital health innovation; youth participation in health systems; locally driven SRHR and mental health solutions; economic empowerment; scaling sustainable community-based innovations.

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Mbah Clarisse Engowei is a biomedical researcher at IMPM in Cameroon. She investigates how Chlamydia trachomatis interacts with its human host, work that directly shapes how we detect, treat, and prevent one of the world’s most common yet overlooked sexually transmitted infections in LMICs. Her research sits at the intersection of microbiology, women’s health, and public health action. Clarisse seeks to harness crowdsourcing, participatory approaches, and co-creation to transform how African communities understand and respond to asymptomatic reproductive infections.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Community-driven solutions that prioritize African women’s reproductive health needs, moving science out of the laboratory and into the hands of the communities who need it most.

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Ammar Bashir Umar is an early-career researcher and lecturer from Kano, Northern Nigeria. He co-leads the Eco-Pad Initiative, a community-embedded program training youth to produce reusable sanitary pads, which has reduced school absenteeism by 40% and created five green micro-enterprises. He also implemented mobile health outreach serving 500+ pregnant women and trained 120 women farmers in climate-resilient agriculture, increasing crop yields by 30%. He has authored 18+ peer-reviewed publications and policy briefs submitted to the Kano State Ministry of Health and local government. He is a member of the Climate Reality Leadership Corps and a Fellow of the Nigerian Bioinformatics and Genomic Network.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Implementation research to scale community-embedded health solutions; integrating menstrual health, maternal health, and environmental sustainability into primary health systems in Northern Nigeria; and translating grassroots evidence into policy.

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Huzaifa Issahaku is a development practitioner from Ghana with a background in public health and extensive experience in community development, youth empowerment, and health promotion. He currently leads health programmes at Songtaba aimed at improving health outcomes in underserved communities in the Northern Region of Ghana.
Over the years, he has worked with diverse civil society organizations and government partners on projects that promote positive health behaviors and enhance the overall health and well-being of people in underserved communities across the region.
Through the SIHI Fellowship, Huzaifa hopes to explore innovative models that leverage local knowledge, community participation, and cross-sector collaboration to create sustainable and scalable health solutions.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Social innovation in health centers on community- led approaches that strengthen health systems, improve health-seeking behaviors, and address the very social determinants of health.

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Dr. Maria Bernadett Carandang is a psychiatrist, researcher, and social innovator from the Philippines whose work focuses on digital mental health, social psychiatry, and community-based approaches to well-being. She is a Fellow of the Philippine Psychiatric Association and an Honorary Fellow of the World Association of Social Psychiatry. She holds a Master of Health Science in Mental Health from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her research explores how digital technologies, online communities, parasocial relationships, and artificial intelligence shape mental health and psychosocial well-being across the lifespan. She is particularly interested in fandom-based mental health initiatives and how virtual communities can be leveraged to promote resilience, belonging, and recovery. Through her clinical practice, research, and advocacy, she develops scalable, culturally relevant interventions that address stigma, expand access to care, and translate innovation into meaningful community impact in the Philippines and beyond.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Digital Mental Health, Fandom-based Mental Health

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Temitope Oseni is a public health professional with experience supporting infectious disease prevention and control initiatives at community, national, and regional levels. Her work focuses on disease surveillance, immunization programs, health promotion, community engagement, and evidence generation to inform public health decision-making and improve health outcomes among vulnerable populations.
She has contributed to initiatives that strengthen vaccination uptake, enhance public health awareness, and support disease prevention efforts. Her professional interests lie in translating public health evidence into practical, sustainable solutions that improve access to essential health services and strengthen health system resilience.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Program management, implementation research, community engagement, and crowdsourcing

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Bitira is a medical doctor and researcher passionately working in the fields of HIV/TB programing and care, as well as child and adolescent healthcare. Her research focuses on HIV/TB interactions, non communicable diseases and their risk factors among adolescents and young people living with HIV, and rare complications in children. She holds a masters degree in public health from Makerere University Kampala. Through the SIHI fellowship, she seeks to further explore community engagement and employment of digital solutions to address social inequalities in health care.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Social innovation and AI use in child and adolescent health, implementation research, community engagement, crowd sourcing and crowd funding

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Akachukwu Markfred Ijeoma is a Nigerian changemaker, climate justice advocate, engineer, and youth leader passionate about advancing sustainable development through innovation, policy advocacy, and community-driven impact. With experience spanning climate justice, clean energy, public engagement, and youth mobilization, he has led initiatives that bridge environmental sustainability with health, resilience, and social inclusion across underserved communities. As a YALI RLC Fellow, ONE Champion, Forbes BLK Fellow, and social impact leader, Akachukwu has worked with diverse stakeholders to amplify youth voices in governance and promote locally-driven solutions to pressing societal challenges. Through the SIHI Fellowship, he hopes to explore how social innovation can strengthen equitable health systems, empower vulnerable populations, and accelerate transformative solutions at the drive of climate, health, and community development.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Climate and health systems resilience, clean energy for health access, community-centered innovation, health equity, digital advocacy, and youth-led social innovation.

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Gabriella is a public health researcher and science educator passionate about global health, sustainability, and community-centered impact. She completed a Master of Public Health (Health Policy & Systems) from Imperial College London on a full scholarship, graduating with Distinction. She also earned a BSc in Public Health (Epidemiology) from the University of Indonesia. Her work sits at the intersection of health, environment, and innovation. She co-founded Diverseas, a non-profit that connects communities with nature through science and storytelling, and serves as project coordinator for 30×30 Indonesia, managing grants, reports, and multicultural volunteers for ocean conservation events and youth engagement initiatives. Her experience spans government, startups, and education, including work with the Indonesian Ministry of Health on national non-communicable disease (NCD) programs and with a health-tech startup on product launches and investor outreach.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Co-creation, implementation research, multisectoral interventions, LMICs

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Pam is the Hub Manager of SIHI Philippines, where she supports initiatives in social innovation research and project management. Her work and research interests include mental health, health systems strengthening and policy research, intersectoral collaboration, and health professions education. Her experience spans public health research (e.g., scoping reviews, qualitative research on health policy and systems, and assisting with creating an HTA methods guide for preventive and promotive health technology), managing SIHI innovation initiatives such as the Gelia Castillo Award for Research on Social Innovations in Health (GCARSIH), and assisting with the development of an Equity-Focused Evaluation Tool for SIHs. Through the Fellowship, she hopes to strengthen her competencies in social entrepreneurship and advocacy. She aims to explore trans- and interdisciplinary approaches to SIH curricula, partnerships, and sustainability models, and apply these to support the institutionalization of SIHI Philippines and strengthen mental health initiatives in the country.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Global health, mental health and wellbeing, health systems strengthening and policy research, intersectoral collaboration, and trans- and interdisciplinary approaches for health systems and health professions education

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Jayvee O. Moltio is a registered nurse by profession and currently serves as a Health Education and Promotion Officer at Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center (BGHMC). Jayvee holds a postgraduate degree in Public Health and is currently pursuing a Doctor of Philosophy in Indigenous Studies, with a focus on Medical Anthropology.
Jayvee’s work centers on health communication and promotion, particularly in designing strategic, audience-centered content for digital platforms to improve health literacy and public engagement. Jayvee is especially interested in addressing misinformation and disinformation in the digital age.
Through the SIHI Fellowship, Jayvee hopes to explore innovative approaches in social innovation in health, strengthen digital engagement strategies, and learn from global best practices that can be applied to local health communication initiatives.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Digital Health Communication and Promotion; Addressing Infodemics, Misinformation, Disinformation

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Dr Chigozirim Ogubuike is a public health researcher, educator, and community health professional with experience in research, teaching, and community-based health interventions in Nigeria. She holds a PhD in Adolescent Health from the University of Ibadan. She serves as an Adjunct Lecturer at the School of Public Health, University of Port Harcourt, and a Community Health Officer at the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital. Her research focuses on maternal, child, and adolescent health, sexual and reproductive health, HIV prevention, climate change and health, malaria, cancer, and health systems strengthening withprogram expertise in qualitative and implementation research. Passionate about community engagement and knowledge translation, she works with communities, young people, and healthcare providers to co-create sustainable health solutions that promote equity and improve population health outcomes.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Social innovation in health, community engagement, participatory research, implementation research, health promotion and education, youth engagement, and knowledge translation. She is particularly passionate about transforming research findings into accessible learning resources, including digital and multimedia formats.

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Victory Oluwatunmise is a public health professional and health researcher interested in digital health, reproductive health (particularly contraceptive care and male involvement in family health), and mental health. She has contributed to a range of research projects, including qualitative and quantitative studies, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses. Her work is driven by a commitment to translating evidence into practical solutions that address health inequities, improve access to care, and strengthen health systems.
Through the SIHI Fellowship, she hopes to deepen her understanding of how social innovations are identified, evaluated, scaled, and integrated into health systems, while learning from and collaborating with a diverse network of practitioners and innovators across different contexts.

Area of interest in social innovation in health:
Social innovations that improve access to healthcare, strengthen community participation, and leverage digital technologies to address health challenges in underserved populations.