Environmental and Health Sciences Faculty & Staff

Melanie Jefferson Kankam, a laboratory instructor in the Environmental Science and Studies Program since Fall 2010, is a graduate of Clark Atlanta University. She obtained her B.S. and M.S. degrees in the biological sciences on a dual degree full scholarship program called PRISM-D. Her scientific research experience spans several areas of science to involve biology, cardiovascular disease, earth systems science, HIV/infectious diseases, and neuroscience. After more than seven years of bio-medical wet-bench research conducted at various facilities including Morehouse School of Medicine and the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, she decided to pursue the study of Science in a way that allowed her to interface more with people.

Jefferson Kankam spent two years in corporate America working for a pharmaceutical company in the neuroscience division before she eventually found her way back to academia. It was after visiting the continent of Africa and witnessing first hand the environmental inequalities that people face globally that she decided teaching in the environmental science department at Spelman College was where her passion and interests would be best exercised. She has loved every moment at Spelman, and believes it is not only her duty to educate students on the applications, relevance and utter importance of the science of our environment, but to teach them how to be productive citizens in all aspects of life.

In keeping with her first academic love, research, Jefferson Kankam also works in the renal department at the Emory University School of Medicine where she coordinates and conducts clinical research studies at the Atlanta VA Medical Center. Outside the aforementioned, she enjoys music, concerts, yoga, trying eclectic cuisines, traveling and spending time with her daughter.