Perreira to help communities with implementation of new health care act

Krista Perreira
Krista Perreira

Public policy professor Krista Perreira has received a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant that will allow her to assist communities with implementation of the new Affordable Care Act (ACA).

In particular, Perreira’s work will identify the challenges faced by state and federal policymakers in enrolling immigrant families and their children into health insurance options available through the ACA. She will also evaluate promising practices that community-based organizations, private employers and public agencies have utilized or can develop to increase enrollment into health care insurance programs, especially among immigrants and their children.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is the nation’s leading philanthropy on health and health care. Perreira is among a select group of scholars to receive a $100,000 New Connections grant.

New Connections is a national program designed to introduce new scholars to the Foundation and to expand the diversity of perspectives that inform the Foundation’s programming.

“I am extremely proud to be among the junior investigators/midcareer consultants honored with this prestigious grant,” said Perreira. “This award will connect me to a network of established experts in research and evaluation related to health and health care, while providing me with an opportunity to evaluate a program that has far-reaching implications for the well-being of new Americans.”

Perreira also is a fellow at the Carolina Population Center and in July, will become the new director of UNC’s Office for Undergraduate Research.

More information about New Connections is available at http://www.rwjf-newconnections.org/index.html.