Research Areas
Scholarship of teaching and learning; Sexual and reproductive health; Adolescent health; Program evaluation
Experience in Action
Leveraging her training as an epidemiologist, Samantha Garbers works with community-based, clinical, and educational stakeholders to integrate rigorous methods for process and outcome evaluation into interventions, with a focus on promoting sexual and reproductive health and rights, adolescent health and well-being, and educational engagement.
She works in partnership to develop, adapt, implement, and evaluate innovative interventions to improve public health for diverse populations including sexual and gender minority youth and adults, adolescent males and women seeking reproductive health care, Latinx and Black communities, and individuals with limited health literacy.
Samantha has served as Principal Investigator on projects including a mind-body integrative health intervention to improve sleep for adolescents living in urban areas, community-based participatory research to improve pregnancy intention screening for patients served in primary care settings, and assessing telehealth-supported long-acting reversible contraceptive services in school-based health centers.
In her academic leadership and educational research Dr. Garbers applies the same principles of innovation and person-centered interventions, with a focus on inclusive teaching; monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEAL) in education, and the scholarship of teaching and learning.
Select Publications
Public Health Interventions and Research
Garbers S, Ancheta AJ, Gold MA, Maier M, Bruzzese JM. Sleeping Healthy, Living Healthy: Using Iterative, Participatory Processes to Develop and Adapt an Integrated Sleep Hygiene/Mind-Body Integrative Health Intervention for Urban Adolescents. Health Promotion Practice. 2023 Jul 25:15248399231184453.
Garbers S, Hunersen K, Nechitilo M, Fisch M, Bell DL, Byrne MW, Gold MA. Healthy Weight and Cardiovascular Health Promotion Interventions for Young Adult Men of Color: A Systematic Review. American Journal of Men’s Health. 2018l 12(5): 1328-51.
Garbers S, Srinivasulu S, Falletta KA, Bermudez D, Almonte Y, Baum R, Coriano M, Iglehart K, Mota C, Rodriguez L, Taveras J, Tobier N, Grosso A. “If you don’t ask, I’m not going to tell you:” Using community-based participatory research to inform pregnancy intention screening processes for Black and Latina women in primary care. Women’s Health Issues 2020; 30(1): 25-34.
Educational Research
Garbers S, Joseph MA, Jankunis B, O’Brien M, Fried LP. Fighting Oppression, Racism & White Supremacy through Action, Research & Discourse (FORWARD): Building a model to hold schools of public health accountable for anti-racism work. American Journal of Public Health. 113(10): 1086-88.
Garbers S, Crinklaw AD, Brown AS, Russell R. Increasing student engagement with course content in graduate public health education: A pilot randomized trial of behavioral nudges. Education and Information Technologies. 2023 Mar 28:1-7
Affiliations
Adjunct Associate Professor, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, Heilbrunn Department of Population & Family Health
