Our Board

WORLD is seeking candidates for it’s Board of Directors. We are interested in community members who bring expertise and life experience in a broad range of areas including fund development, marketing, financial management, life with HIV, media work, and community organizing. If you have interest in discussing Board membership please email Cynthia Carey-Grant, Executive Director at ccarey-grant@womenhiv.org

Current Board Members:

Monica Gandhi MD, MPH is an Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Dr. Gandhi attended Harvard Medical School and then came to UCSF in 1996 for residency training in Internal Medicine. After her residency, Dr. Gandhi completed a clinical fellowship in Infectious Diseases and a postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for AIDS Prevention Studies (CAPS), both at UCSF. She also obtained a Masters in Public Health from Berkeley in 2001 with a focus on Epidemiology and Biostatistics. Her research efforts have focused on HIV/AIDS in U.S. women through the Women’s Interagency HIV Study (WIHS). The WIHS is a large multisite, prospective cohort study established in 1994 to study the natural history, clinical and laboratory findings of HIV in women. Dr. Gandhi has also participated in research efforts involving the impact of HIV/AIDS in women in India. She works in a specialty clinic at the UCSF Parnassus campus that exclusively serves HIV-infected women, mostly of poor socioeconomic status, and has a number of patients who have benefitted from the services at WORLD. Her main interests are reading classical and contemporary fiction and independent film. She also has a husband, two dogs, and lives in San Francisco.

Laura Thomas is a health policy consultant and grant writer in San Francisco. She has been advocating on HIV/AIDS issues for nearly twenty years, since she first became involved in AIDS activism through ACT UP. Over the years she has worked for Tenderloin Health, Continuum HIV Day Services, the San Francisco Department of Public Health, and the San Francisco AIDS Foundation. Laura is a proud recipient of the AIDS Hero Award from the 2000 AIDS Candlelight Memorial. In her free time, she is a volunteer with the HIV Prevention Project needle exchange and the Golden Gate Raptor Observatory, and serve on the Boards of Directors for the CAEAR Coalition and the Asian & Pacific Islander Wellness Center. Laura lives in San Francisco with her wonderful partner and thier three elderly cats.

Gail Silverstein is currently an attorney and clinical law professor at University of California Hastings College of the Law. She specializes in lawyering for low-income people in the areas of disability, housing and employment. Prior to becoming a clinical professor, Gail was a lawyer in the HIV/AIDS Legal project of the East Bay Community Law Center (EBCLC) for six years. While at EBCLC, she was the chair of the Executive Committee of the Family Care Network, a holistic group of medical, social and legal providers for women and families infected and affected by HIV of which WORLD is a part. Gail has also worked with people with HIV on their legal issues at The Hawkins Center in Richmond, California and at AIDS Legal Council of Chicago. Besides lawyering, Gail enjoys yoga, cooking and travelling.

Jane Maxwell, MPH, is a researcher/writer/editor at Hesperian, publishers of self-help, health-care books including Where There Is No Doctor, Where Women Have No Doctor, A Book for Midwives, A Health Handbook for Women with Disabilities, and HIV, Health and Your Community. Jane has international experience in women’s health and health education in Ghana, the Central African Republic, Zimbabwe, Mexico, Guatemala, Brazil, China, India, Nepal and Uganda. She has also volunteered for many years at the Berkeley Free Clinic as a phlebotomist in the Clinic’s anonymous HIV testing site.

Cecilia Chung, is the Chair of the San Francisco Human Rights Commission of the City and County of San Francisco.

Shonali Shome, is the Legal and Gender Advisor for AIDS-Free World, an international AIDS advocacy organization. She conducts legal and advocacy work on issues of gender, sexual violence and HIV/AIDS, and has recently worked in Uganda, Zimbabwe, Botswana and South Africa. Prior to and during law school, Shonali worked or volunteered for the Global Fund for Women, the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies, Global Rights, the Tahirih Justice Center, and Medical Students for Choice. In 2007 she was awarded the Kroll Foundation’s Human Rights Fellowship to conduct legal research on the intersection of HIV/AIDS, gender and disability in Uganda.

Patricia LaBrie Calloway, RN, 

PHN

is the Quality Improvement Coordinator at the Alameda County Public Health Department in the ACE Program that emphasizes chronic disease management through preventive primary care at a designated medical home. The program goal is to improve access to high quality health care and health outcomes for individuals. The program focuses on diabetes, hypertension and asthma and she maintains a database to use for quality improvement activities. Ms. Calloway recently completed a fellowship in the Cultural Competence Leadership program with the Health Research and Educational Trust Foundation. She has special interest in the care of people with HIV and is a board member for W.O.R.L.D. She works part-time in labor and delivery at Highland Hospital in Oakland.

Alejandra Cano, is the Bilingual Hotline and Outreach Manager at Project Inform. Alejandra was born in Salta, Argentina and immigrated to the United States in 1989 with a place to stay and $200. After unsuccessfully trying to study Political Science and Biology in Buenos Aires she envisioned going to America to study at a renowned school. She’s always lived in the Bay Area, first in Marin County then in Berkeley. There she managed to finished her Bachelor’s in Psychology. Her first full time job in an office 9 to 5 in America was at WORLD. First as a Latina Peer Advocate in 2001 for three and a half years. Later, after living in Spain and traveling around Latin America for two years (another wish made true), Alejandra worked as a Family Care Network Consumer Group and Retreat Coordinator in 2004 for two years. She has always been a fan of the idea that accessing sensitive information is key to HIV care, so she couldn’t refuse the opportunity to work at Project Inform in San Francisco as a Hotline & Outreach Manager where she has been working since November 2008. At her new job, Alejandra helps people join forces for a better health system for all, particularly for the ones with special needs. As I write these words thinking about UC Berkeley, San Francisco, Latin America, Spain, Marin County WORLD, Project Inform, and the Bay Area I can only feel very privileged. Salud and God Bless America… and the rest of the WORLD!

Erin O’Donohue, is the Associate Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer of the International Child Resource Institute, where she manages a global network of programs for children and families in North and South America, Africa, Asia, and Europe. Prior to joining ICRI, Erin worked as a Senior Staff Attorney at Legal Services for Children in San Francisco, where she represented child clients in abuse/neglect, education, and immigration cases. At LSC, Erin served as the Director of the Guardianship Project and provided permanency planning services to many families impacted by HIV/AIDS. She also was the founder and Director of the Young Women’s Empowerment Project, which provides legal and social services to adolescent girls involved in the foster care and juvenile justice systems. Erin has spent the last 16 years working for a number of local, national and international non-profit organizations that assist women and families living with HIV/AIDS, including the UCSF AIDS Health Project, Better Existence with HIV, Chicago Women’s AIDS Project, and Dublin AIDS Alliance.