Please join us in congratulating Dora Correal, Director of Community Equity, on her Emerging Leader Award from the Geiger Gibson Program in Community Health Policy.
This national award honors young, emerging leaders within community and farmworker health centers who have made a career in the health center family and personify the enduring strength of health centers.
You can read more about the award and the Geiger Gibson Program in NOAH’s latest news but here’s an inside look at Dora’s accomplishment and what’s brought her to where she is today.
Q&A with Dora Correal
Q: What was your reaction when you found out you were being honored with this award?
A: Unexpected! Very Humbled, proud, and accomplished! Also, I felt and feel a greater sense of responsibility to live up to it.
Q: When you look back over your time with NOAH, and how the team and impact of Community Resources has grown, how do you feel?
A: In awe (very proud of where we are at and where we will be), inspired (our team never ceases to impress me) and committed to the NOAH Family.
Q: Why did you want to work in community health?
A: I was born in Mexico and moved to the United States with my parents who were seeking a better life after their textile mill in Mexico went bankrupt. My mother went on to work as a farmworker in California, and my dad was a landscaper. For me and my family, access to healthcare was a luxury, unaffordable, and impossible.
I was the first one in my family to go to college and earned my Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration.
When I became pregnant, I personally experienced again how access to healthcare was a luxury, unaffordable, and impossible, until I was helped by a Community Health Worker in New Mexico and she helped me navigate the complex system. It was then when I knew I wanted to be part of the change and help individuals have access to healthcare in way that not only would it make possible and affordable, but also a human right.
Q: As an emerging leader in Community Health, what are you excited about for the future of how community health centers will impact individuals and communities?
A: I am super excited about many things including: increased understanding and interest of the social determinants of health (SDoH), the awareness that not everyone has access to healthcare in the same way and the innovative solutions that occur when people and organizations are mission aligned.
Q: What has been your inspiration that has led you to be where you are now?
A: One of my favorite quotes is: “And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.” ― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
I believe that everyone should have access to healthcare equity; to receive individualized care to bring them to the same level of health. Directly or indirectly, we are all helping achieve this at NOAH. This is my drive and my daily inspiration. There is a golden rule about treating other’s the same way you want to be treated, well, I created my own version: treating others even better than how you were treated.
