I study how education harms and heals communities.

Hello world! I’m Erin (she/her/hers).

I make visible what harms us
so we can prioritize what heals us.

“You cannot change any society unless you take responsibility for it, unless you see yourself as belonging to it and responsible for changing it.”

—Grace Lee Boggs

I tell (counter)stories about grassroots organizations, education programs/institutions, and people who navigate these spaces. As a woman of color data scientist, I apply my cultural intuition to make sense of unstructured data from our daily lives.

How do we name the mundane conditions that continue to cause harm? How can we transform these conditions so we can heal? I facilitate this knowledge production by increasing access to information and connecting community members.

If this resonates with you, I invite you to follow me on LinkedIn, Twitter/X, or Google Scholar.

Download my CV here. (updated 12/1/23)

Publications

  • “Harnessing the collective power of researchers as truth seekers and organizers as community builders in affirming spaces for holistic community wellbeing is love in action.”

    How do alternate knowledges advance antiracist public health praxis?

    In this community case study, we explain the development of the Filipinx/a/o Community Health Association as a critical race counterspace through the lens of Pinayism.

    Manalo-Pedro, E., Mackey, A., Banawa, R. A., Apostol, N. J. L., Aguiling, W., Aguilar, A., Oronce, C. I. A., Sabado-Liwag, M. D., Yee, M. D., Taggueg, R., Bacong, A. M., & Ponce, N. A. (2022). Learning to love ourselves again: Organizing Filipinx/a/o scholar-activists as antiracist public health praxis. Frontiers in Public Health, 10(958654). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2022.958654

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  • "We urge educators to decenter Whiteness when not only teaching about racial health inequities but also throughout public health graduate training."

    Whose knowledge is legitimized when defining public health needs?
    Whose lenses are used to prioritize solutions?
    Whose insights drive change?

    Whose knowledge heals? Drawing from Critical Race Theory as applied toward the field of Education, we critique three responsibilities for teaching about public health: assigning readings, shaping analytical lenses with theories, and modeling change through andragogy.

    Manalo-Pedro, E., Walsemann, K. M., & Gee, G. C. (2023). Whose Knowledge Heals? Transforming Teaching in the Struggle for Health Equity. Health Education & Behavior, 50(4), 482–492. doi.org/10.1177/10901981231177095

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  • "These embodied legacies of colonialism and racism ...drive our work. However, the truth of our ancestral history is rarely acknowledged."

    This reflective article describes how we, a trio of doctoral students, applied critical pedagogical approaches to identify gaps in our public health training, reflect on the value of our lived experiences and ancestral histories, and take action toward advancing change within our School of Public Health.

    McSorley, A.-M. M., Manalo-Pedro, E., & Bacong, A. M. (2021). Doctoral Students as Agents for Change: Shaping Our Public Health Training Environment. Pedagogy in Health Promotion, 7(4), 299–303.

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  • "The focus on differences by race rather than on exposure to racism masks opportunities for collective care."

    What does structural racism look like among Filipinx/a/o Americans?

    We argue that racism defines who is visible. We discuss pathways through which colonialism and racism preserve inequities for FilAms.

    Sabado-Liwag, M. D., Manalo-Pedro, E., Taggueg, R., Bacong, A. M., Adia, A., Demanarig, D., Sumibcay, J. R., Valderama-Wallace, C., Oronce, C. I. A., Bonus, R., & Ponce, N. A. (2022). Addressing The Interlocking Impact Of Colonialism And Racism On Filipinx/a/o American Health Inequities. Health Affairs, 41(2), 289–295.

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  • "Even fewer studies exclusively sample UndocuAPI, leverage appropriate community-oriented recruitment strategies, and use historical context to inform explanatory theories."

    The aim of this study was to examine the extent to which immigration enforcement stressors mediate the relationship between DACA and depression using data from the BRAVE Study 4. We share this mediation analysis of immigration policy and mental health, contextualized through racialized illegality, to assert the importance of race-conscious, empirical research.

    Manalo-Pedro, E., & Sudhinaraset, M. (2022). Deferred depression? Mediation analysis of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals and immigration enforcement among Undocumented Asian and Pacific Islander students. SSM - Population Health, 17, 101008.

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  • "Because doctoral research is infrequently presented as a viable career option for CSU alumni, participating in MTPCCR provided CSU alumni with access to a vast network of colleagues and mentors."

    Using CRT concepts of whiteness as property and interest convergence we show how opportunities for doctoral study are “raced and restricted” in California’s tripartite higher education system.

    This unusual case study focuses on the Minority Training Program in Cancer Control Research (MTPCCR), a summer training program that has promoted research careers among master’s level students and professionals since 1999.

    Manalo-Pedro, E., & Allen, W. R. (2023). 8. Doctoral Pathways via Racial Health Equity: Bridging the Apartheid of Knowledge with California State University Alumni. Philosophy and Theory in Higher Education, 5(1), 157–186.

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  • "Due to the long history of Filipinx people caring for Americans, which is rooted in U.S. colonialism, it is time that we show Filipinx people that they count, both literally and figuratively. Aggregated data hides the stories of Filipinx Americans' struggle and survival amid the COVID-19 pandemic."

    This article explains how aggregated data hid the unequal burden of COVID-19 in the Filipinx/a/o community. It accompanies Power and Health, a KCET documentary that shows how community health conditions are shaped by systems of power.

    Ponce, NA, Huerto, R, & Manalo-Pedro, E. (2021, March). Disaggregation for Health Equity: Shedding Light on COVID-19’s Impact on the Filipinx Community. https://www.kcet.org/shows/power-health/disaggregation-for-health-equity-shedding-light-on-covid-19s-impact-on-the-filipinx-community

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  • "We share our stories and activism in Lakas to spotlight an alternative path to radical healing already occurring beyond the therapy room: community activism, grounded in Pinayist and Ethnic Studies principles."

    How can participation in youth mentoring provide healing?

    In this critical collaborative autoethnography, I joined five other Pinays to reflect on and analyze our intersectional oppressions and empowering experiences in the Lakas Mentorship Program.

    Saavedra, J. A., Manalo-Pedro, E., Mackey, A., Dela Cruz, M., Abilo, N., & Higa, L. K. (2024). “Together, We Empower. Together, We Are Enough”: Radical Healing Among Pinay Scholar-Activists. Women & Therapy, 1–27. https://doi.org/10.1080/02703149.2024.2348930

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  • "We expand the understanding of who is impacted by immigration policy beyond undocumented students to include U.S. citizen students with undocumented parents and even U.S. citizen students with lawfully present parents."

    Do students with varying self and parental immigration status experience the relationships among threat to family, anxiety symptoms, and political engagement differently?

    We conducted stratified moderation analysis of cross-sectional survey data with UC students from immigrant families to assess potential mental health benefits of activism.

    Manalo-Pedro, E., Enriquez, L. E., Nájera, J. R., & Ro, A. (2024). Anxious Activists? Examining Immigration Policy Threat, Political Engagement, and Anxiety among College Students with Different Self/Parental Immigration Statuses. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/00221465241247541

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Employment

15+ years of program planning, project management, and data analysis in education, public health, and business.

  • Utilize data science and critical race methods to detect and document racism as a barrier to health equity with the UC Berkeley Data Lab & the HoPES Study. Introduced protocols for data management and project management for complex multimethod studies.

  • Developed and directed the Cal State Fullerton Allied Health Academy, a health career pipeline program funded by the U.S. Dept. of Health & Human Services Health Resources & Services Administration

  • Developed curriculum for online and hybrid formats for the Exploration of Health and Allied Health Professions course at Cal State Fullerton

  • Advised undergraduates on academic requirements and graduate school preparation for College Academic Counseling at UCLA

  • Managed projects and analyzed data for clients’ IT security and financial assurance through PricewaterhouseCoopers

Training

PhD (in progress) & MPH (2015)
Department of Community Health Sciences

UCLA Fielding School of Public Health

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BS Computer Information Systems (2008)
College of Business Administration

Cal Poly Pomona

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Summer Institute Participant & Intern (2015)
Minority Training Program in Cancer Control Research at UCLA

National Cancer Institute