Adelita G. Cantu, PhD, RN is an associate professor at UT Health San Antonio School of Nursing and specializes in community/public health nursing and clinical nursing research.
Adelita has been a champion for climate change in her community, academic setting, and professional nursing practice. She helped form the Air and Health Collaborative in San Antonio, Texas as a mechanism by which to inform the community about the adverse health effects of air pollution, how to protect those most vulnerable to the effects of air pollution, and how to improve local air quality. With grant funding, the Collaborative was able to form the Youth Leadership Air Quality Academy, a project aimed at empowering low-income, predominately Hispanic youth as citizen scientist leaders in taking action to protect the health of their communities from the adverse health impacts of poor air quality. Adelita continues her climate work in educating future health health professionals by including the topic of climate change into curriculum.
Read more about Adelita’s story in ecoAmerica’s Let’s Lead on Climate guide.