Cohort Level: V

Career Goal: Fariha would like to become a social scientist/policy researcher who is equipped with the relevant skills to understand and interpret data to improve the living and working conditions of marginalized communities at the frontlines of environmental injustices.

Expected Graduation Date: May 25, 2026 

Degree: Ph.D. in Public Policy 

CESSRST Faculty Advisor: Fernando Tormos-Aponte

Research Title: Moving Beyond Resilience to Reparative Restoration of Historically Marginalized Communities

Research Synopsis: In this mixed-methods research, Fariha will explore perceptions and lived experiences of residents in Baltimore who are exposed to increasing threats of natural/human-induced hazards and relief disparities using an intersectional framework. Together with that, she will empirically examine the historical and political processes such as residential segregation that adversely impact disaster resilience and health outcomes of marginalized communities. For the qualitative inquiry, Fariha aims to conduct transformative and community-based participatory action research to learn about the social, political, and economic issues that affect vulnerable people through their voices. A key research question will be: how do the intersectional social positions of people affect their perceptions of risks, experiences with the hazards, and coping in the aftermath? Fariha will utilize NVivo to extract codes and themes around the topics discussed. In the quantitative analysis, Fariha will seek to correlate (through software programs like SAS or R) and map (using ArcGIS Pro) the relationships between the effects of residential segregation, social vulnerability, and health outcomes. This study will offer insights into views, behaviors, and practices of underrepresented groups at the frontlines of compounding environmental and social injustices. It will investigate the potential relationships among the indicators of residential segregation, social vulnerability, and health outcomes of such communities. It will advocate for a set of long-term neighborhood restoration and social investment policies that are reparative and restorative to dynamically improve the living and working conditions of the historically disenfranchised communities across the United States and its territories.