Friday Fellow Feature: Antoine B. Richards

Our featured Fellow for July 2023 is Antoine B. Richards. Antoine is a Doctor of Science (DSc) candidate in Emergency Management at Jacksonville State University and serves as Chief of Staff for the Institute for Diversity and Inclusion in Emergency Management (I-DIEM). His research interests include social determinants of health / social vulnerability; resilience; community capacity building; health / disaster equity, and policy. Aligning research with practice, his dissertation entitled “Expanding Equity: The Case for Diversity and Inclusion in Emergency Management” examines the longitudinal expansion of equitable approaches in emergency management through policy advocacy.

Richards became a Bill Anderson Fund Fellow in Fall 2018 and has served multiple roles on the BAF Student Council, including member of the Writing Committee, Vice Chair of the Student Council, and Fellowship Intake Committee Lead, which he helped establish to improve nationwide recruitment efforts. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Alliance for National and Community Resilience (ANCR), Advisory Board for the Association of Healthcare Emergency Preparedness Professionals (AHEPP), and Advisory Committee on Equity (ACE) for the Gulf of Mexico Climate and Resilience Community of Practice. He is also a founding Advisory Board member for the Georgia Trauma Foundation, aligning his tenured career in healthcare and public health with his advocacy for improved outcomes among underserved communities.

Academically, Richards has maintained a 4.0 GPA throughout his doctoral matriculation and has significant contributions to field including seven (7) scholar, peer-reviewed publications, four (4) written and verbal Congressional testimonies, 29 presentations at national conferences and symposia, and six (6) contributions to federal policies and programs centered on equity in emergency management. A native Atlantan, he relocated to Tampa in 2019 and was inducted into the Emerging Leaders of Tampa Bay in 2020 where he served as the 2021 Inclusion Group Co-Chair and was a 2021 and 2022 finalist for the Deanne Dewey Roberts Emerging Leader of the Year Award. He was also a 2021 Top 10 Under 40 recipient from Morehouse School of Medicine in recognition of his outstanding achievement and commitment to the creation and advancement of health equity, and a 2017 recipient of the Dr. Bill Jenkins Award for outstanding community service in public health.

Richards currently serves as Adjunct Faculty at the University of Nevada Las Vegas in the Master of Science in Emergency and Crisis Management program where he teaches ‘Human Considerations in Disaster.’ He is also a Graduate Teaching Assistant at Royal Roads University in Victoria, British Columbia in the Master of Arts in Disaster and Emergency Management where he teaches Foundations of Disaster and Emergency Management. Richards received his Master of Public Health degree from Morehouse School of Medicine and a Bachelor of Science in Communication and Media Studies from Kennesaw State University. 

Learn more about his past experiences, current work, and connect with him on LinkedIn: here