Elizabeth Gerndt is a Project Director at Counter Tools and is passionate about healthy eating and active living. Learn more about Elizabeth’s background in her staff profile below.
Tell us a little bit about your background before you came to Counter Tools.
After finishing undergrad at Clemson, I moved to Atlanta to receive my Master of Public Health at Emory University. My first job after grad school was working for the health department in South Carolina on several policy, systems, and environmental change initiatives related to healthy eating and active living.
Prior to coming to Counter Tools, I managed food and built environment initiatives for the SNAP-Education program at NC State. While tobacco point-of-sale work was new to me when I started at Counter Tools, I had spent lots of time in the retail environment all across North and South Carolina completing store assessments and talking with retailers about selling healthy food.
How long have you worked at Counter Tools and what made you decide to work here?
I started working at Counter Tools in January 2020 – not long before Covid-19 lock-downs began. I was excited to be part of a small, hardworking team that is dedicated to the mission of improving place-based public health.
What is something you enjoy about your role?
Right now, I’m the project director for six different states across the country. I love being able to build these relationships and learn about their many different strategies for advancing place-based public health. It’s always interesting to see similarities in the challenges they face, and it’s especially rewarding to be able to use these connections to help our partners learn from each others’ experiences.
Do you have any pets, children or other family members you’d like to mention?
I live in Cary, NC with my fiancé, Ryan, and our puppy, Beasley!
