GAAHPN
Executive Board Members
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Coastal Georgia region
Dr. Alvin D. Jackson, a family practice physician and former Director of the Ohio Department of Health, served from 2007 to 2011 under Gov. Ted Strickland. He was the first director to visit every local health department in Ohio's history, overseeing a $700 million budget, 1,300 employees, and regulatory compliance for 128 local health departments and numerous health care providers. During his tenure, he prioritized public awareness, education, disease prevention, and data-driven decision-making for Ohio's 11.5 million residents.
Dr. Jackson has held notable positions, including serving on the ASTHO Board of Directors, the Institute of Medicine's Board on Population Health, and multiple boards at The Ohio State University. Born in Portal, Georgia, he integrated his high school and later earned a B.S. from Andrews University, studied at Oakwood College, and received a Luard Scholarship to study at The University of Keele in England, traveling extensively across Europe and Russia.
He earned his M.D. from The Ohio State University and completed his residency at Mercy Hospital in Toledo, Ohio. In 2004, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Heidelberg College. Dr. Jackson is active in numerous professional and civic organizations, including the NAACP, American Academy of Family Physicians, and the Ohio Public Health Association. A sought-after lecturer, he frequently speaks on Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, and wellness.
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Central Savannah River region
Darryl Nettles, DPA is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Cancer Prevention, Control, and Population Health (CPCPH) program in the Georgia Cancer Center (GCC) at Augusta University (AU). His current focus has been on studying SDOH, health disparities, and obesity prevention as it relates to cardiovascular disease and cancer. Dr. Nettles’ long-term career goals are to become an independent investigator and study Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) in disparate populations and relate these to health disparities within these groups.
Dr. Darryl Nettles is an outstanding role model and goes above and beyond to serve underserved Georgia communities. He is always eager to pursue opportunities that enable him to learn more so that he can extend his reach in helping others, and he does all this with a smile.
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Southwest Georgia region
Angela Jones is a retired teacher from the Dougherty County School System. In her retirement years she is an independent contractor for historical research writing projects in Southwest Georgia and other areas that impact community knowledge and awareness of civic importance, human/historical contributions, sacrifices, and community resources. She is also an Educational Consultant, and Instructor in reading and writing skills.
Angela is active in the community on the local and state level, as a board member on the Georgia African American Preservation Network (GAAHPN) for the SW Region of Georgia, Albany’s Thronatesska Heritage Center, and serves as Chair on the local Historical Preservation Commission (HPC). She is a contributing weekly writer to her local Southwest Georgian Newspaper.
She is a member of Mt Zion Church and is a singer with the Albany Ga. Freedom Singers serving as the spokesperson/storyteller, and historian/researcher for the group. Angela is a native of Albany, Georgia by way of Detroit Michigan. She is married to Emerson Jones a retired MSW from Atlanta Public Schools. Angie has one daughter, Keila, one son, Carlos, and three grandchildren, Kiersten, Serenity, and Brycen. Underground Railroad Under My Feet and Shelter in Place are her first published books.
GAAHPN
Active Members
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Central Savannah River region
After graduating Aquinas High School in 1972, Retired Lt. Col. Joyce Law attended Augusta Technical College, where she studied electronics and found herself surrounded by Army veterans and retirees who told her about what to expect in military life. In Law’s 34 years in the military, she broke many barriers and participated in areas she never could have had she stayed in Augusta.
She enlisted in the Women’s Army Corps during the Vietnam War, which she called a pivotal time in history — not just in world history but in her personal history as well. She took part in Operation New Life in 1975 after the fall of Saigon.
During her time at Fort Shafter in Honolulu, she was recruited by the Hawaiian National Guard. Soon after Hawaii, she returned to Augusta for a stint and was accepted into the Georgia National Guard as the first African American woman commissioned as a non-medical officer.
After she retired, she took part in the Troops to Teachers program and taught special education in the Augusta area. Now she devotes herself to history as well as veteran causes. She works to ensure that African Americans who served in the military have some type of markers on their headstones, as well as completing paperwork to have American Legion Post 505 placed on the National Register of Historic Places.
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Middle Georgia region
Veronica L. Womack serves as the Executive Director of the Rural Studies Institute at Georgia College and Professor of Political Science and Public Administration. She received her BA of Communications, MPA and Ph.D., in Political Science from the University of Alabama.
Her research focuses on rural communities, with a particular focus on the Southern Black Belt region of the American South. She is a noted author and researcher. Funders of her research include USDA, the Robert W. Johnson foundation, and the Southern Economic Advancement Project (SEAP). She is also the founder of the Blackfarmersnetwork.com, a website that highlights the legacy of African American farmers, in the Black Belt region of the South. She has been featured on various media outlets including The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, GPB, The Nation, and Georgia Trend for her work in the region.
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Atlanta region
Tracy Rookard- Shaw is the Chair of the Douglas County Board of Education, where she manages an annual budget in excess of $250 million and provides oversight of more than 3,500 employees. She additionally serves as the Senior Management Consultant for an international engineering firm with more than 30,000 employees. Her daily role with the firm encompasses providing financial, program, and project management for a range of infrastructure and water engineering related projects.
Mrs. Rookard-Shaw is also an avid collector of African History and the creator of the nationally recognized program “An Evening of History and Jazz”. This event showcases pieces from her private collection of documents with original signatures which include Dr. W.E.B. DuBois, Dr. Booker T. Washington, Mr. Frederick Douglass, The Honorable Thurgood Marshall and more. Mrs. Rookard-Shaw’s collection is considered one of the largest private collections of African American original documents and artifacts in the southeast United States. She is the author of the highly acclaimed book, The Ghosts of Douglass County which documents the journey of 19th century African American legislators who were instrumental in the creation of Douglass County, Georgia in the year 1870.
Mrs. Rookard-Shaw is a an HBCU graduate who received a BA in Public Policy and conducted her MBA coursework both at Alabama A&M University. She is also a proud member of the West Georgia (GA) Chapter of The Links, Incorporated.
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Heart of Georgia Altamaha region
Doris Tomblin received her Bachelor of Science (BS) from Savannah State University in 1976 for Social Studies Teacher Education. She is a member of the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. (Delta Nu chapter)
Tomblin was a teacher for 34 years within the Evans County School District, where she provided education for students grade 8 - 12. She also provided critical support to their Positive Behavior Intervention Counseling Program.
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Atlanta region
Natasha Washington received her BA of English from Tuskegee University, and her Master of Heritage Preservation from Georgia State University.
Her professional interests include the location, preservation, and documentation of cemeteries. Mrs. Washington was involved in a cemetery survey of Mary Field Cemetery on Daufuskie Island, South Carolina, in February of 2023 documenting over sixty existing grave markers and conducting a GPS survey of the land, locating over seventy unmarked graves. Natasha has visited and documented several historically Black cemeteries in Georgia, and she is the web developer for the Historic Black Cemeteries of Georgia website.
Natasha serves as board member of the Georgia African American Preservation Network (GAAHPN) for Georgia’s Atlanta region.