Dr. Freneka F. Minter, a native of Murfreesboro, TN, is the Sr. Community Research Program Manager for the Meharry-Vanderbilt Alliance.  Before coming to the Meharry-Vanderbilt Alliance, she was the Sr. IT Project Manager for the Research portfolio at the Center for Improving the Public's Health through Informatics under the Department of Biomedical Informatics at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.  That position included a “without compensation" (WOC) appointment with Research Services at the Tennessee Valley Healthcare Systems VA Hospital in Nashville, TN allowing her to work on VA research studies.   Freneka completed her dissertation titled, "Gender Differences in Health Service Utilization Among Veterans with Acute Kidney Injury" at Walden University for her Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree in health services conferred on August 13, 2017. She also has both a B.S. in Chemistry (May 2002) and an M.S. in Health, Physical Education, and Recreation (HPER) with a concentration in Health (December 2005) from Middle Tennessee State University. She holds the following credentials: Master Certified Health Education Specialist (MCHES®), credentialed by the National Commission for Health Education Credentialing (NCHEC®) in 2011; Project Management Professional (PMP®), credentialed by the Project Management Institute (PMI®) in 2018; and Certified Clinical Research Professional (CCRP®), credential by the Society of Clinical Research Associates (SOCRA®) in 2021. In the past, Dr. Minter’s previous experiences include Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU) as a Health Education Specialist in the Health Communications and Technical Training Department; the Tennessee Department of Health, Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention Program as a Public Health Educator; the Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities Division for Alcohol and Drug Abuse as a Prevention Specialist; and MTSU's Center for Health and Human Services as Project Coordinator/Assistant. From these experiences, she has worked collaboratively with over 15 different local, state, and federal agencies on Alcohol, Tobacco, and Other Drug prevention efforts, Cancer Control and prevention efforts, and Heart Disease and Stroke prevention efforts. She has also worked collaboratively with several research labs at prestigious universities and hospitals.