Byllye Avery and Michael Bird on Promoting Healthy Communities

The Sage Colleges welcomed distinguished community organizers and health activists Byllye Avery and Michael Bird to the Opalka Gallery on Thursday, October 22 at 6:00 p.m. The event was free and open to the public.

Avery is the founder of the National Black Women’s Health Project and the Avery Institute for Social Change. She is a clinical professor at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University, an advisor to the National Institutes of Health and was a visiting fellow at Harvard School of Public Health.

Bird, MSW, MPH, has devoted his career to enhancing the health of the public, particularly the health of American Indians and Alaskan Natives. Bird is a Santo-Domingo – San Juan Pueblo Native American from New Mexico. He was the first Native American to serve as President of the American Public Health Association. In his more than 25 years of public health experience, Bird has worked on a variety of health activities including medical social work, substance abuse prevention, health promotion, and disease prevention and health care administration.