Dr. Michelle Villegas-Gold is Associate Dean, Strategy and Partnerships and Assistant Clinical Professor with the School of Technology for Public Health at Arizona State University. Prior to joining the school, Michelle served as the Assistant Vice President of Strategic Initiatives within ASU Health, where she led the design, build, and launch of the school and Public Health Technology Corps, informed strategic initiatives in key areas (like AI for health, health literacy, and health workforce development), and supported large philanthropic proposal development.
Before joining ASU Health, Michelle worked in the ASU Knowledge Enterprise for five years, where she developed new strategic initiatives to accelerate and strengthen health research and partnerships in critical areas across the university.
Michelle began her work at ASU as a University Innovation Fellow in the Office of the President at ASU, where she developed and incubated new university-wide initiatives that advance ASU's charter and design aspirations. From 2015-2018, while pursuing her Ph.D., Michelle served as the Center-wide Research Assistant for the Center for the Future of Arizona, within the Office of the President Emeritus at ASU where she supported Drs Lattie Coor and Sybil Francis.
Before joining ASU, Michelle spent seven years working with people impacted by trauma, including victims and survivors of interpersonal violence and sexual assault, in various capacities, including as a crisis worker, victim advocate, trauma-informed yoga teacher, and master's level counselor in inpatient, intensive outpatient, and outpatient settings with children, adolescents, and adults.
Michelle has a Ph.D. in Global Health from Arizona State University with a certificate in Women and Gender Studies (2018), a Master of Public Health within the Global Health and Leadership track from New York University (2014), and a Master of Counseling degree from Arizona State University (2009). Michelle completed her Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Arizona where she majored in Psychology and minored in French (2006).