As a part of NORC’s Center for Health Communication Science, Rachel has led and contributed to multiple health communication projects including mixed-methods evaluations of public health campaigns and studies to understand the impact social media on health behavior.  She previously led an evaluation of the CDC Foundation’s mental health communications campaign, How Right Now, to assess the campaign’s reach, engagement, and impact with teachers and school staff. She worked on the campaign since its inception during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and previously served as the partnership liaison and project manager for the project.  

Rachel also supports NORC’s Health Communication AI portfolio of work that is examining how AI can be used as a tool to reimagine how we communicate health information and support people’s health and well-being. She has led development of research and dissemination products including the Rural Health Information Hub’s evidence-based toolkits on topics including mental health, substance use, mobile health, and emergency preparedness. For PCORI, she recently designed an issue brief that compares oral antipsychotics and long-acting injectable antipsychotics for managing schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

She has contributed to numerous projects during her career at NORC including moderating focus groups to assess older adult perceptions of CDC’s Fall Prevention Planning tool, conducting formative research to inform the Kansas Department of Health and Environment’s COVID-19 vaccine campaign, developing case studies to illustrate the impact of CDC’s Adult Immunization program, managing a nationally representative study of Head Start’s Disability Services Coordinators for the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, and evaluating Y-USA’s ForeverWell Expansion project.

Prior to joining NORC, Rachel worked as a clinical research assistant at Children’s National Medical Center where she coordinated the establishment and evaluation of a medical home for victims of trafficking and managed a randomized control trial of adolescent mental health care coordination. Additionally, she analyzed CDC’s Violence Against Children data to examine the prevalence and consequences of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in Honduras.