Howard Garrison Advocacy Fellow

Zari McCullers

Zari McCullers is a graduate research assistant at the Penn State College of Medicine. 

Describe your interest in participating in the Howard Garrison Advocacy Fellowship.
McCullers: When I entered graduate school, I didn’t know what it looked like to be a policy advocate, or that it could be a place where someone like me could build a career that bridges research, advocacy, and community care. I did know that I was smitten with research, and I was deeply committed to building systems that made science more equitable, accessible, and just. After a multiple-year tenure of dedication to uplifting my campus community, I realized that meant stepping into the policy arena.

My policy journey began with taking on immense leadership during my second year of graduate school in the scope of cultural competency, community building, and student success. Relentless in instilling change, for three consecutive school years, I served as the devoted director of the Diverse Graduate Student Group, a campus entity dedicated to fostering identity and culture-based safe spaces for graduate students. What started as nothing - just myself in a lecture hall asking students what they needed - grew into the largest, most active organization on our medical campus, managing a multi-thousand-dollar portfolio, producing over 30 events, and launching the first student-led awards ceremony celebrating diverse leaders. I also created and directed the Cultivating Underrepresented Students in Science and Public Health (CUSP) Summer Bridge Program for underrepresented students entering graduate school. Three years later, I look back on my leadership chapter with gratitude for the path it led me down in science policy.

Continuing, it wasn’t long into my leadership journey that I found myself picking up opportunities that were rooted in advocacy and civic engagement. One of my first experiences was as a Movement Labs Advocacy Fellow, where I worked alongside over 100 reproductive justice organizations to track state-level legislative campaigns. I then joined the New Voices for Reproductive Justice IGNITE Fellowship, deepening my understanding of how local reproductive health policy and justice intersect with science. These experiences exposed me to advocacy as a tool for equity and human dignity.

How do you plan to use the knowledge and experience gained through your participation in the Howard Garrison Advocacy Fellowship?
McCullers: I plan to use the knowledge gained via the Howard Garrison Advocacy Fellowship to advance both my personal policy training and my community-focused leadership. Immediately, I hope to apply what I learn back to my institution, where I’ve founded and serve as the lead coordinator of a graduate science policy group entitled Science Policy, Advocacy, Research, and Knowledge (SPARK). Through SPARK, we’ve launched advocacy workshops for students in basic science and public health research. Nonetheless, we have a long way to go - we have goals in organized advocacy, policy writing, and campus engagement that are ahead of us. I would cherish the knowledge gained through this program to pour into this growing campus initiative.

Long-term, I aim to work in science policy program development and management, whether in a federal agency, nonprofit, or academic setting, such as programs like the Howard Garrison Advocacy Fellowship. My goal is to design programs that fund scholars, expand research access, and build stronger connections between science and the public good. The policy analysis, communication strategies, and networking that the Howard Garrison Advocacy Program provides would directly inform this path.

I also look forward to learning how to navigate legislative conversations and engage with stakeholders, particularly in areas such as research equity, addiction science, and mental health. The insights I gain from this fellowship will help me serve as a more informed and impactful advocate, not just for my own research, but for the communities I hope to support through my work.

Using no more than 250 words, describe your research as you would to a non-scientist.
McCullers: Addiction is a widespread public health issue in the United States, affecting millions of individuals and families across all communities. My research focuses on two conditions: alcohol use disorder (AUD) and binge eating disorder (BED). These disorders often appear together in the same individuals, which suggests that they may share overlapping brain pathways. I study those shared pathways to understand better how and why these behaviors develop.

Going deeper, my work explores how alcohol and high-fat foods interact to change brain function, behavior, and inflammation. I use animal models (mice and rats) to examine how the brain’s reward and stress systems respond to these substances, with a special focus on a part of the brain called the amygdala. This region plays a key role in emotion, impulse control, and addictive behavior.

Another important part of my research looks at how these conditions differ between males and females. While social and environmental factors play a role, we also know that the brain itself is “wired” differently depending on sex. Understanding these biological differences is critical to developing more effective treatments and prevention strategies for everyone.

Ultimately, I hope my research helps uncover how diet, alcohol, and sex differences in the brain contribute to the development of addiction, and how we can better support those affected by it.

Briefly describe any past or present participation in additional career exploration activities, experiences, and/or programs.
McCullers: As I grew in my scientific training, I also began entering formal policy spaces. At the National Science Foundation, I interned with the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR), supporting efforts to distribute research funding more equitably across the country. I developed communication tools to disseminate information about the program to universities in target jurisdictions.

Later, as a member of the National Science Policy Network (NSPN), I participated in the Science Policy Scholars in Residence Program, where I completed a multi-week policy boot camp and collaborated with a group of scholars to develop a policy brief on energy transitions. Through this residency, I later joined the Center for Environmental Health, where I worked on PFAS regulation and hospital sustainability, merging environmental policy, science communication, and public health outreach. Recently, I joined Women’s Voices for the Earth, another environmental policy non-profit, where I’ll serve in a leadership capacity, co-directing undergraduate fellows in environmental policy and reproductive health.

On campus, I founded SPARK, our first graduate science policy group. Through SPARK, I’ve hosted a multitude of career discussions, advocacy events, and policy workshops. I’m also part of the PA Science Policy Coalition, where we are actively working to architect the first Pennsylvania Science Policy “Hill Day” in Harrisburg, PA. We also recently collaborated with the Union of Concerned Scientists on graduate student mobilization efforts in the wake of the changing landscapes in research funding.

Zari McCullers is a member of American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Endocrine Society, FASEB member societies.