
Matthew Joseph
Graduated in 2017
6 Semesters in HICH
My Involvement
It was a bit of an accident? The original intent was to create a collaboration between public health officials and students to create projects that would improve the health of the local community. This brought me in contact with various parts of the healthcare system I did not even know existed, despite their important roles in serving underserved populations. This included social workers, community health workers, health department staff, community organizers, and numerous others. It expanded my understanding of what the healthcare SYSTEM was as a whole, outside of the medical side many of us who started as premed was familiar with.
​
I was part of the original group who started HICH, involved meeting with various community partners to discuss expectations for community learning agreements, presenting the project's framework to faculty to have their support with guidance from Dr. Price. Also assisted in the proceedings of the Community Greens project in first developing the plot of land worked within Nu Waters Co-op. Received grant funding for the Community Voice Toolbox Project's start from the Clinton Global Initiative. Helped in structuring panels and events for community health outreach, including helping with keeping things running during the first Community Health Worker Conference held at the University of Houston.
Favorite Memory
Getting up every morning during the summer of 2016 and trying to figure out the amorphous plans Dr. Price had for the university and building an experience for students out of it. Learning to understand Dr. Price had bigger goals than we had originally imagined, and adapting to those goals was always a treat.

Lucinda Ba
Graduated in 2017
6 Semesters in HICH
My Involvement
Lucinda played an integral part of HICH, serving as a Project Head Coordinator, a Creative Care volunteer, a HICH healthy dal volunteer, a PEERS Site Lead & Mentor $ Project Head, a Responsive Resourcing Co-Founder Project Head/ Mental Health & Domestic Violence lead/ volunteer, and as a HICH mentor.
Favorite Memory
I have so many! For internal officer memories: planning meetings with PHC, 'carrel hours'; the summer 2020 plan of meme-ing everyone and appreciating Christine's work before she left; spring 2021 new officer training (memes again!); and the officer social we had at Hermann Park (spring '21). All were fun experiences I had and I've enjoyed my time serving on the officer team and finding a support group and community here. For shared HICH memories, I was and still proud of my mentees from Lamar HS winning the 2019-20 PEERS Competition; their reactions of genuine surprise and excitement were so heartwarming. Hosting all the workshops and HICH Healthy Day were all fun memories too, clearly I can't pick my favorite.