Sabrina Cherry, an assistant professor of public health at the Univerity of North Carolina at Wilmington, was named the recipient of the 2020 Franklin H. Williams Award from the Peace Crops.
The Franklin H. Williams Award recognizes ethnically diverse Peace Corps volunteers who have returned from their assignments and have demonstrated a lifelong commitment to civic engagement, service, diversity, inclusion, and world peace.
Dr. Cherry has worked for nearly 20 years in public health. Her professional experience started as a Peace Corps volunteer in Gambia, West Africa, from 2001-03. She realized her love for the field of public health while living and serving in Gambia, where she focused on creating sustainable income for women.
“Peace Corps remains the gift that keeps giving,” Dr. Cherry said. “At UNCW, I use my experience as a volunteer to encourage students to travel — if even domestically, study abroad, pursue nontraditional routes of postgraduate education and training and learn about other cultures. Receiving this award 20 years after I submitted my Peace Corps application is an honor and a reminder of the work we get to do in fulfilling the third goal of the U.S. Peace Corps: to help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans. What a timely reminder to recommit to the understanding of other people.”
Dr. Cherry is a graduate of Morris Brown College in Atlanta. She holds a master of theological studies degree from Emory University in Atlanta and a master of public health degree from the University of South Carolina. Dr. Cherry earned a doctorate in public health at the University of Georgia.