Sheila Castillo is Midwest Latino Health Research and Policy Center (MLHRC) 's Program Manager for the federally funded Center of Excellence for the Elimination of Disparities (CEED). CEED is facilitating the growth of a coalition of organizations that will work to reduce cardiovascular disease and diabetes in Latino and African American communities in the Chicagoland region.
Prior to working for MLHRC, Sheila served as Communications Coordinator for the Chicago Teachers' Center of Northeastern Illinois University. In addition to managing internal and external communication, she successfully organized a coalition of five universities and parents, teachers, and students in over 80 Chicago public schools to inform Congress on the need for a college-access program that had been eliminated from the federal budget. Castillo opened the Chicago office of a national environmental education organization and trained teachers to organize student-developed action research projects on environmental issues. As director of the Chicago Association of Local School Councils (CALSC), she developed an independent citywide association of 140 local school councils with 2,400 members. CALSC provided training to LSC members and advocated on their behalf at city and state levels.
Castillo has a Masters degree in Urban Planning and Policy from University of IL at Chicago and a BA in Political Science from Northern Illinois University . Her areas of expertise are program planning, organization, and implementation, which includes forging relationships among groups to build collaborations and coalitions to pursue common goals.
