History

Westchester Square Partnership was founded in 2008 to address the social and health-related needs of South Asian immigrants living in the Westchester Square and Parkchester neighborhoods of the Bronx. Initial programs included English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and health education classes. Through a participatory needs assessment we identified a number of social and health priorities of Bangladeshi women including immigration issues, family stress, emotional distress and weight problems. Over the past year, we have sought to develop programs to address these priorities. WSP works closely with community members to develop, implement and evaluate its programs. The Mothers’ Club is a self-governing group that meets monthly to develop its own programming. The Mothers' Club acts in an advisory role to WSP.

Staff

Alison Karasz (Co-Director) is a clinical psychologist and health researcher at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. She has been providing clinical services and conducting research on South Asian women’s health for the past 15 years. She is a founder of WSP.

Jean Burg (Co-founder) is a family physician. Dr. Burg is the Chairman of the Department of Family Medicine in the North Bronx Health Care Network. She provides primary care services and conducts community research in the Bronx community.

Moumita Zaman (Assistant Program Director) joined the WSP team with a background in youth organizing and experience with working on multifaith coalitions, issues of domestic violence, education, and legal advocacy, as well as organizing programming around the arts.

Anjali Jaiman is a recent graduate of Swarthmore College with a background in education and sociology. She is helping to design curriculum for APPLE and Project Heal, as well as the Komen Breast Cancer education initiative.

Erin Halstead joins the WSP team this year as a participant in the New York Intern Program. With a background in TESOL, she will be developing and teaching a new ESOL curriculum, as well as helping out with office administration and volunteer management.

Laila N Akhter is a Community Health Worker at WSP. Laila has a master’s degree in History from Dhaka University. She enjoys her job as a CHW because she wants to help her community, specifically women. Women play the most important role in the family. Laila believes that women can also play an important role in society.

Gulshan Ara Chowdhury works as a Community Health Worker for WSP while also serving as the current president of Mothers' Club.  A mother of two, she is an active volunteer for her son's school and the American Cancer Society. Gulshan loves working with people, and wants to help all women feel empowered to do something with their lives.

Kazi Rubyna Begum is a Community Health Worker at WSP. Ruby has lived in New York for 13 years, and enjoys working with women from the South Asian community here. She has a master's degree from Bangladesh. Ruby has two children.

Mabud Farhana works as Community Health Worker at WSP. She obtained her masters degree in International Relations from University of Dhaka, Bangladesh. She has 4 years of experience in social research and project and program management. She worked as Assistant Program Officer at Bangladesh Center for Communication Programs (BCCP), a non-profit organization initiated through Johns Hopkins University/CCP. She was also employed as Project Management Trainee in the Dept. Of Women's and Gender Studies at University of Dhaka.

Viraj Patel is a primary care physician and is currently an Empire Clinical Research fellow.  Over the next two years, he will work on developing the SAPPHIRE clinical research network.

Board of Directors

Annie Wilson, Chair
Elizabeth Dickinson, Treasurer
Viraj Patel, Secretary
Alison Karasz, Executive Director
Jean Burg
Nandini Deb
Rounak Ahmed
Monami Chakrabarti
Amy Randhawa Sandeep Kaur
Mone Khan