Kathryn Janda-Thomte, PhD
Assistant Professor
Department of Public Health
Kathryn Janda is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Public Health at Baylor University. Dr. Janda received her MPH from University of Michigan School of Public Health in 2015, her PhD from UTHealth School of Public Health in Houston (Austin Campus) in 2020, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at UTHealth School of Public Health in Houston – National Cancer Institute Cancer Research Training Program in 2022. She joined Baylor in 2022 and values the opportunities at Baylor to teach, conduct research, mentor students, and serve as the MPH Capstone Coordinator for Community Health Sciences.
Dr. Janda’s research focuses on food insecurity mitigation and improving healthy food access to promote health equity in underserved communities. Specifically, her research centers on examining where food insecurity and minimal healthy food access are occurring; who is disproportionately experiencing these issues; and how to design and evaluate community-engaged programs seeking to address these problems. Rooted in the social-ecological model, her work involves collaborating with community organizations and employing various methodologies (geospatial, quantitative, and qualitative) to better understand multi-level influences on food insecurity and limited healthy food access in local and regional contexts.
Areas of Research Interest
- Food Insecurity & Healthy Food Access Across the Lifespan
- Health Equity & Disparities
- Program Evaluation & Development
- Mixed Methods (Quantitative, Qualitative, & Geospatial)
Current Courses Taught
- PUBH 5360 Evaluation in Public and Community Health
- PUBH 5699 Capstone in Community Health Science