Whitney Francis

Peter Harbage Health Policy Fellow

Whitney Francis (she/her) is the 2023-2024 Peter Harbage Health Policy Fellow with Western Center’s health team. Every year, the Fellowship provides one emerging leader a year-long experience to deepen learning and capabilities in health care policy and leadership in the state of California.

Some of Whitney’s formative experiences prior to joining the Wester Center include working in a clinic-based food as medicine program within the SF Department of Public Health, working on Alameda County’s All IN Eats Circular Food Economy initiative, and conducting research and evaluation on school meal reform in Oakland. Her initial desire to understand the root causes of food insecurity has expanded her to focus more broadly on issues of structural racism and economic inequity, the underlying drivers of many of the social challenges facing our society today. Shaped by her background in environmental and racial justice combined with her experiences working towards advancing food security, Whitney strongly values community and equity and approaches challenges with an interdisciplinary lens.

Whitney earned her Master’s in Public Health and Master’s in City Planning from UC Berkeley and earned a B.S. in Earth Systems and minor in Asian American Studies from Stanford University. In her free time, Whitney enjoys taking on new hobbies, improvising in the kitchen, and eating her way around the Bay Area.