Zuckerman College of Public Health’s Beamer receives communications award

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Paloma Beamer, PhD, a professor and associate dean for community engagement at the University of Arizona Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health, received the 2026 Society of Toxicology Public Communications Award at the society’s annual meeting in March.

The society presents the honor to someone who has made a major and longstanding contribution to broadening the general public’s awareness of toxicological issues. The organization lauded Beamer, who is also director of the Community Engagement Core for the U of A Southwest Environmental Health Sciences Center, for her “sustained, community-centered communication and outreach on environmental exposures and health, with particular impact in communities that are historically underserved and disproportionately affected by environmental contamination.”

The society also applauded Beamer’s skills in developing sustained partnerships and two-way engagement with communities as well as her dedication to mentoring.

Beamer, who directs the U of A BRISA Center for the Environment, said her top-level training was important but also credited her bicultural heritage with giving her important perspective. She grew up splitting her time with one grandmother who lived in a traditional house in Mexico and another who had a home with a pool in California.

“This gave me a firsthand understanding from an early age of the disparities that exist in our world,” said Beamer. “Therefore, I have dedicated my professional life to understanding and preventing the disproportionate burden of environmental disease as a result of poor water or air quality, not only in developing countries like Mexico but also in our poorer and marginalized communities in the U.S.”

Beamer, a self-described shy and introverted numbers cruncher, studied civil and environmental engineering in college. As she grew interested in exposure science — the study of how people are exposed to chemical and biological contaminants and ways to reduce those exposures — Beamer learned more about the importance and responsibility of public communication.

“Winning this award is a testament to that little girl who wanted to use her bicultural heritage to address these issues,” she said. “It is a testament to the communities that I have had the privilege to work with and to the taxpayers who have paid for that work. I feel I owe it to the taxpayers to make sure that our efforts are communicated effectively to them and those impacted so that we may inform the public on science and collectively advocate for policies to improve public health.”