Michèle Banner, Ph.D., has worked across academia and the private sector for 26 years. Banner was initially trained as a social psychologist. Her research, now in the Department of Public Health Sciences, relates to mental health stigma, health promotion activities, education and harm reduction, and contributes to socioeconomic and health equity in underserved populations in the México-United States border region.
Banner is currently the sole senior research scientist in the College of Health, Education and Social Transformation. Like tenure-track faculty, research scientists at NMSU follow a three-tier classification system. Across its five colleges, NMSU employs 28 associate research scientists, 17 intermediate research scientists and 13 senior research scientists.
Banner also serves as the associate director of Crimson Research, a grant-funded research and program evaluation group housed in the Department of Public Health Sciences. In this role, she serves as primary investigator on research and evaluation projects and leads marketing, branding and networking efforts around the state to raise the profile of the program and obtain funding. Her position is completely grant-funded.
Banner previously worked as a government contractor, including time with NMSU’s Physical Science Laboratory from 2007 to 2009, before joining the college in 2015.
“My work is exclusively community-engaged and involves multiple agencies and county government, both locally and around the state,” she said. “I use culturally responsive research methods and analyses and work in partnership with diverse communities.”
She has led numerous research projects as a primary investigator. Highlights include serving as the external program evaluator for the Doña Ana County Health and Human Services Local DWI program for the past 10 years, conducting research and evaluation for their Court Compliance Division and Outreach and Education Division. Currently, she helps the agency implement and evaluate efforts to reduce polysubstance use overdose deaths via their five-year grant from the New Mexico Office of Substance Abuse Prevention, and evaluates a mental health training grant via their five-year grant from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Agency.
Since 2021, she has been the lead external program evaluator on two Guaranteed Basic Income efforts in Hatch and Las Cruces through partnerships with Community Action Agency of Southern New Mexico, Families and Youth Innovations Plus, and Jardin de los Niños. The efforts provide $500 per month for 18 months in unrestricted, direct cash payments to solo caregivers of at least one child under the age of 16; caregivers’ income must be at or below 80% of the average median income.
In 2025, Banner received funding to start a partnership with Rio Arriba County Health and Human Services in which she mentors and trains three undergraduate students from Northern New Mexico College. The students are aspiring researchers and are working on a project for the agency about youth substance use. Additionally, Banner is leading two other projects for the agency, focusing on the unhoused population and opioid use within the county.
She has received federal and regional grants to provide training to professional staff in Otero County to increase awareness and reduce stigma surrounding mental health. Earlier, she studied disconnected youth in Juárez, El Paso and southern New Mexico.
Banner serves as the president of New Mexico Evaluators, the state affiliate of the American Evaluation Association, and enjoys the cross-pollination of academia and board work. She is also a graduate of the 2023 Aggie Leadership Training Academy. Something she is particularly proud of is her role as the writer of the proposal for her department’s doctoral program in health equity sciences, which was designed by department leadership in collaboration with a team at the University of New Mexico College of Population Health. The cooperative program launched in 2023.