Welcome New NBPHE Board Members

The National Board of Public Health Examiners (NBPHE) is pleased to welcome three new members to its Board of Directors: Earl N. Benjamin-Robinson, DrHSc, CPH, FNAP; Shirley Orr, MHS, APRN, NEA-BC; and Scott Strobel, CDI. Together, they bring decades of experience spanning community engagement, public health systems, workforce development, public health nursing, disease intervention, infectious disease response, health equity, and public health education.

As NBPHE continues its work to strengthen the public health workforce through certification, their perspectives will help ensure that our work remains grounded in both the broad foundations of public health and the specialized expertise of professionals working across the field.

Earl Benjamin-Robinson, DrHSc, CPH, FNAP

Dr. Earl N. Benjamin-Robinson brings more than two decades of experience translating public health research into practice through community engagement, systems change, workforce development, and evidence-informed strategies.

As the inaugural Director of the Louisiana Cancer Research Center’s Office of Community Engagement, Dr. Benjamin-Robinson established the Center’s first comprehensive community engagement infrastructure, strengthening partnerships among researchers, healthcare systems, and communities across Louisiana. Previously, as Senior Director of the Louisiana Campaign for Tobacco-Free Living, he led a major statewide tobacco control initiative focused on policy, systems, and environmental changes.

Throughout his career, Dr. Benjamin-Robinson has worked with communities, healthcare organizations, academic institutions, government agencies, and other partners to address inequities related to cancer, HIV, chronic disease, and behavioral health. He is also Founder and Principal of The BACH Group and serves as adjunct faculty at Xavier University of Louisiana and the LSU School of Public Health.

As a Certified in Public Health (CPH) professional, Dr. Benjamin-Robinson also brings to the Board the perspective of a professional who has demonstrated mastery of the foundational knowledge and competencies represented by NBPHE certification.

Shirley Orr, MHS, APRN, NEA-BC

Shirley Orr brings more than 35 years of public health experience and extensive expertise in public health nursing, workforce development, leadership, organizational effectiveness, and systems improvement.

Since 2015, she has served as Executive Director of the Association of Public Health Nurses (APHN), the national professional organization representing more than 3,000 public health nurses working across health departments, academic institutions, and other public health practice settings. In that role, she leads national efforts to strengthen the public health nursing workforce and advance professional practice through leadership, education, advocacy, and collaboration.

Her career has included leadership positions in local and state health departments in Kansas as well as national consulting with public health agencies and organizations across the United States and the U.S.-Associated Pacific Islands. Her work has included projects with the Public Health Accreditation Board, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, health departments, public health institutes, academic institutions, and philanthropic organizations.

Orr also serves on the Executive Board of the American Public Health Association and as the Association’s Treasurer. She is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Kansas School of Medicine–Wichita and a lecturer in the Wichita State University School of Nursing.

Her extensive experience with the public health nursing workforce brings an important perspective to NBPHE as we continue to strengthen opportunities for professionals across public health to demonstrate their specialized knowledge and expertise.

Scott Strobel, CDI

Scott Strobel brings to the NBPHE Board more than a decade of experience in infectious disease investigation and outbreak response, along with a longstanding commitment to advancing the disease intervention profession.

Strobel spent five years as Chief of the STI/HIV Surveillance and Intervention Section for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. In that role, he oversaw public health reporting and investigation related to syphilis, HIV, gonorrhea, and chlamydia and led a statewide team of employees, contractors, healthcare partners, and state and local government collaborators.

A national advocate for Disease Intervention Specialists (DIS), Strobel was a founding member of the DIS Advisory Committee established by the National Coalition of STD Directors and later chaired the committee while serving on the NCSD Board of Directors.

His involvement in efforts to formally recognize the expertise of disease intervention professionals dates back more than a decade. He served as a subject matter expert for the 2015 DIS Certification project conducted by the Public Health Accreditation Board and currently chairs NBPHE’s Certified in Disease Intervention (CDI) Advisory Committee.

As a CDI credential holder himself, Strobel brings both leadership experience and the perspective of professionals working on the front lines of disease intervention to the NBPHE Board.

Bringing Public Health Perspectives Together

NBPHE certification is built around a fundamental idea: the knowledge and skills of public health professionals matter.

That includes professionals whose expertise spans the breadth of public health as well as those whose careers are rooted in specialized areas of practice. It also means listening to the people doing this work in communities, health departments, healthcare systems, universities, and organizations across the public health landscape.

The addition of Dr. Benjamin-Robinson, Orr, and Strobel strengthens the range of perspectives represented on the NBPHE Board and brings valuable expertise in areas that are increasingly important to the public health workforce.

We are pleased to welcome all three to the NBPHE Board of Directors and look forward to the leadership, experience, and insight they will bring to NBPHE and its work to advance public health through certification.