Lumas Joseph Helaire, PhD

Dr. Helaire currently serves as the Assistant Dean for Population Health Management and Health Equity Education at the Harvard Chan School of Public Health. He provides leadership for the creation of Population Health Management and Health Equity certificate and degree programs. Dr. Helaire also works with the Harvard HealthLab Accelerators, for social impact ventures that offers comprehensive support to Harvard University students who are entering the innovation space, with a focus on interdisciplinary teams. He also assists the dean and members of HSPH in the identification, development, and promotion of health equity collaborative initiatives.

Formerly he served as Senior Associate Director, overseeing operations and programs in the Office of Academic and Multicultural Initiatives at the University of Michigan. He also directed the University’s GEAR UP, a federal pre-college program that partners with schools in preparing students from low-income backgrounds for post-secondary education. He directed various other student development programs, including Men of Color Leading in the Classroom, a program designed to increase the number of men of color that go into K-12 teaching. He was the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) lead for the suite of offices under the Office of Diversity Equity and Inclusion. Dr. Helaire chaired the university’s Annual Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Symposium planning committee and coordinated the annual keynote lecture which hosts national and international activists and social justice organizers.

Currently, Dr. Helaire serves on the Board of the Center for Community Health Education and Research Services, Inc. (CCHERS), a community-based organization that promotes the development of “academic community health centers.”

From 2013-2021 he served as the inaugural Board president for the James and Grace Lee Boggs School in Detroit, MI. The school uses project-based curricula to nurture creative critical thinkers who contribute to the well-being of their community.

Dr. Helaire received his B.A. in Psychology with honors from Morehouse College, where he was a Phi Beta Kappa graduate. He then earned his M.S. in Developmental Psychology, and Ph.D. in Education and Psychology from the University of Michigan.