Team

Malene serves as a Community Engagement Officer for Brownsville, and as a board member of Public Sentiment, supporting the mission to find inclusive ways to create solutions where the voices of community members are heard.  

As a native of Brooklyn, NY, Malene has invested her time in founding and running her own not-for-profit that serves the Brooklyn community, Women’s Access to Empowerment Inc., lovingly known as Brooklyn WATE. It has been a space for Black Women to find and absorb holistic versions of wellness and is home to the Black Women Do Initiatives.

Her community service is rooted in her 12 years experience in the NYFD Emergency Medical Services, and while earning her Masters in Public Health – making information and education available to Black & Brown people who can struggle to have both access and equitable health standards influencing their wellbeing.

Suzanne Dikker is a Research Associate Professor affiliated with the Max Planck — NYU Center for Language, Music and Emotion (CLaME) at the Department of Psychology.

Her work merges cognitive neuroscience, performance art and education, using a ‘crowdsourcing’ neuroscience approach to bring human brain and behavior research out of the lab, into real-world, everyday situations. Her goal is to characterize the brain basis of dynamic human social communication.

As a founding member of the art/science practice Harmonic Dissonance Collective, Suzanne leads various projects, including MindHive, a community science platform that supports student-teacher-scientist and community-scientist partnerships for human brain and behavior research.

Mike Lenihan is Founder and CEO of Public Sentiment. Mike’s mission is building trust and understanding between people. As a trained conflict resolution practitioner and community organizer, he is helping people on opposing sides of big issues better understand one another.

Mike has lived life on both sides of a big issue himself – he came out in the middle of the US marriage equality battle. This formative experience shapes Mike’s work bridging social divides and correcting misperceptions to reduce destructive conflict.

Prior to founding Public Sentiment, Mike worked was a Program Fellow at the Clinton Global Initiative, a Research Fellow at the European Stability Initiative in Berlin and Istanbul, a Senior Associate at Hattaway Communications, and the Northeast Grassroots Outreach Director for Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, where he helped organize the campaign’s highest-producing phone bank in the nation.

Within his own community, Mike has served as the volunteer lead for Out in Tech’s Youth Mentorship program, piloting its program connecting now more than 300 Black and Brown LGBTQ+ high schoolers and young professionals within the City’s public schools and universities with skills-building, mentorship, and connection to NYC’s tech industry.

Along with training at the Morton Deutsch International Center for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution, he holds a Bachelor’s in Public Policy and Law from Trinity College, and a Master’s in International Affairs, specializing in international conflict resolution, from Columbia University.

Athenia is a Community Engagement Officer in Brownsville, and the the Founder of Umoja Events, the producer behind one of New York City’s largest and longest-running Juneteenth celebrations, Juneteenth NYC.

She has over 14 years of experience as a small business owner, and has successfully led, grown, and advised other small businesses, leveraging her expertise in psychology and business strategy – applying knowledge of human behavior and motivation to enhance organizational performance, culture, and well-being.

As a Middlebury College graduate, she values learning, collaboration, and diversity, and seeks to empower her community with a vision that centers economic prosperity and racial equality.

Felicia Zerwas is a Lead Researcher at Public Sentiment. She believes that empathy, inclusivity, and transparency play critical roles in facilitating effective communication, promoting trust, and building constructive and sincere relationships

Before joining Public Sentiment, Felicia worked with local organizations in Arizona –  Homeward Bound and Banner Health’s Child Life – providing support for children and adults, and seeing the influence that different types of relationships have on people’s lives. 

Felicia pursued her interest in relationships at the Health and Interpersonal Systems Lab at the University of Arizona and graduated with her B.S. in Psychology. She has continued this work at the Emotion and Emotion Regulation Lab at the University of California, Berkeley, earning her Ph.D. in Social Psychology.