Dr. Heather M. Butts

Public Health Expert / Professor / Author

Heather M. Butts received her B.A. from Princeton University. She was a history major, concentrating in American and African-American Studies. She received her J.D. from St. John’s University School of Law, her Master’s in Public Health from Harvard University and her Master’s in Education from Columbia University’s Teachers College.

Professor Butts is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Healthcare and Public Administration and Public Health Law and Bioethics at LIU Post. She is also the Director of the LIU Post Honors College. In addition, has held appointments as an Adjunct Professor in Health Law and Bioethics at St. John’s School of Law and a Lecturer at Columbia University School of Public Health.

Prior to her teaching, she served as a regulatory specialist at Columbia University’s Medical Center Institutional Review Board (IRB). Her responsibilities included training and educational efforts of the Columbia University research community. Before that professional experience, she functioned as a Senior Associate at Pricewaterhouse Coopers, LLP in New York City where she performed compliance risk assessments on projects involving reviews of faculty group practices, policies and procedures.

Professor Butts is the co-founder or H.E.A.L.T.H for Youths, Inc. a nonprofit organization which focuses on college readiness and preparation. Her organization partners with 53 programs each year to help more than 4,000 students achieve their dream of going to college. During COVID-19, her organization has worked on dozens of projects to help the community including: turning little free libraries into food pantries; getting resources to under priviliged families; organzing several community gardening programs to get fresh produce to those in need.

Her publications include: Alexander Thomas Augusta: Physician, Teacher and Human Rights Activist for the Journal of the National Medical Association, Personality and Policy Perception: What Responses are Seen as Appropriate for COVID-19, Federal Agencies Continue Focus on Clinical Trial Oversight (co-author) , Housing Bias and Post-traumatic Stress Disorder(co-author) and two books including African American Medicine in Washington, D.C.: Healing the Capital During the Civil War Era and Healing Civil War Veterans in New York and Washington, D.C.