Sonia Gonzalez

About

• Grew up in: El Paso, Texas
• City or town call home: I lived in NYC for 20 years and feel at home among New Yorkers.
• Current location: Austin, Texas
• Background/experience: clinical trial, non-profit programming, evaluation, digital health start-up
• As a child, you wanted to be: doctor + ninja + professor
• Motto: Fail forward and let’s get it done!

Sonia K. González has a proven track record since 1995 working with adolescents and young adults in HIV prevention and college health. She also holds an Interactive Technology & Pedagogy (ITP) Certificate and was a Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award Fellow (NIMH, F31MH099924).

Previously, Dr. González co-founded the Young Women of Color HIV/AIDS Coalition, served as a Board of Director of a community-based nonprofit confronting institutional racism and inequity, the Red Hook Initiative, and was Deputy Director of an NYC-based nonprofit preventing HIV.

Recently at the Healthy CUNY Initiative, she applied a design thinking approach to develop and pilot the Healthy CUNY app supervising a team of 17 undergraduate and 7 graduate students. She is particularly interested in mobile health technology to improve behavioral health and connection to services among young people.

She is recognized for:

• Data-driven product development on a tight timeline
• Statistical and research methodologies including individual interviews, focus groups, social observations, surveys, metrics design, evaluation
• Presenting complex findings to diverse audiences, from lay to executive level
• Fostering productive internal and external stakeholder relationships  modeling dignity and respect for all
• Solutions-oriented staff training and management
• TedX Talk, "Connecting the Digital with the Human"

HEALTH + TECH

I bridge the health and tech worlds with digital health applied research grounded in equity.

Below are samples of my work:

HEALTHY CUNY APP

• Launched 2 college health apps across 5 NYC college campuses on time and within budget
• Coordinated project development and evaluation between science, medical, and design teams
• Hired and supervised a team of 17 undergraduates and 7 graduate students

GURHL CODE

• My mixed-methods dissertation evaluated gurhlcode.org, a web-based app I designed and built informed by Black and Latinx women in NYC aged 18 to 24.
• Peer-reviewed publication: Recruiting young women of color into a pilot RCT target sexual health: Lessons Learned and implications for applied health technology research

FAQ

You have a doctorate. Why digital health?

• That’s right. I have a doctoral degree in Public Health, specializing in community health. I supplemented my technical training by earning an Interactive Technology and Pedagogy Certificate. Digital health is how I bring this training together.
• The promise of scale to effect change for the many makes digital health very appealing. Combining science with tech seems to be generating promising results, especially around behavior change. This makes it an incredibly exciting time to work in digital health.

What motivates your work?

• My family history and my Mexican-American matriarchal home that focused on family, community, education, and serving those in need.
• Some of my earliest experiences threw me into the fires of public health work. This included serving LGBTQ+ youth who were thrown out of their homes after coming out to their parents, drug-using and drug-abusing youth, and collaborating with young, poor, people of color in New York City. This work continues to inform what I do.
• I’m inspired by young people and those who challenge inequities and the status quo.
• My training in evidence-based decision-making. Show me the data.

Why work with you?

• I treat people like people, with respect and a smile.
• I listen and ask why with genuine curiosity.
• I’m adaptable and as comfortable at a table with colleagues as I am with a Board of Trustees.
• I have good ideas along with the willingness to listen to others. I love building solutions as a team.