Friday Fellow Feature: Diamond Joelle Cunningham, MPH

Our Featured Fellow for November 2024 is Diamond Joelle Cunningham, a fourth-year PhD student at the Celia Scott Weatherhead School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine at Tulane University. Diamond earned her Master of Public Health with a concentration in Urban Public Health from the Rutgers School of Public Health in 2021 before beginning her doctoral studies under the mentorship of Dr. Caryn Bell.

Diamond joined the Bill Anderson Fund as a Fellow in 2021 and quickly took on leadership roles within the Student Council. She served as Fundraising Committee Co-Chair for the 2022-2023 academic year and was elected Student Chair for 2023-2024, notably during the organization’s milestone 10th anniversary year.

Her research integrates data science, artificial intelligence (AI)  policy, and health equity frameworks to examine systemic factors affecting maternal health outcomes among Black, Brown, and Indigenous women. Diamond’s work emphasizes ethical applications of artificial intelligence and machine learning (ML) to address public health challenges, with a particular focus on understanding how policies and systemic factors create and perpetuate health inequities. She will defend her dissertation in 2025.

Diamond’s commitment to advancing health equity and ethical AI has earned her several prestigious appointments and fellowships. She currently serves as an intern with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Public Health Law Program. This year, she was selected as a Future Leader at the University of Michigan’s Institute for Data & AI in Society, where she engaged with leading experts in responsible data science and AI applications. Through the Bill Anderson Fund’s network, she was selected for the National Institutes of Health’s Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning Consortium to Advance Health Equity and Researcher Diversity (AIM-AHEAD) in 2022. In this role, she addressed critical gaps in AI/ML research representation that can perpetuate biases and exacerbate health disparities in underrepresented communities. She also holds a fellowship with the National Research Center on Poverty and Economic Mobility Professional Development program.

Throughout her academic career, Diamond has demonstrated a strong commitment to mentorship and education, serving as both a Graduate Teaching Assistant and peer mentor for graduate students. Her scholarly contributions include a recent co-authored publication examining tobacco companies’ marketing strategies targeting the queer community. This March, Diamond served as a panelist for the American Dental Education Association Student Diversity Leadership Program, discussing dentistry’s role in public health emergency preparedness and health equity advancement—an opportunity made possible through recommendations from BAF alumni.

Looking ahead, Diamond was recently selected as a 2025 Tulane Changemaker Institute Fellow, where she will develop a mobile application to enhance the graduate school experience for students of color. The app aims to foster social support, networking opportunities, and resource sharing—inspired by her transformative experience as a Bill Anderson Fund Fellow.

Beyond her academic work, Diamond enjoys fostering neonate puppies with local nonprofits and shelters. In her spare time, she can be found fishing or catching up on episodes of Judge Judy.
You can connect with Diamond on LinkedIn to stay updated on her panels, academic progress, publications, and more.