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Mary-Ann Standing is the Director of the Centre for Health and Community Research (CHCR) and the Secure Island Data Repository (SIDR) at the University of Prince Edward Island. With twenty years of experience in research, analytics, and data infrastructure development, she has dedicated much of her career to advancing the use of administrative data to support research, policy, and decision making.
With a background in epidemiology, psychology, and applied health research, Mary-Ann has worked across federal, provincial, and academic sectors. Her work with administrative data began in the federal correctional system, where she focused on addictions research, before moving into the provincial healthcare system and later academia. Her current interests center on ethical data use, data governance, and finding inclusive and accessible ways to bring community voices – particularly those not often heard in data science – into decision-making about how data are used.
She serves on the Executive and Scientific Leadership Committees of the Maritime SPOR Support Unit and is part of HDRN Canada’s Leads Team. She also supports several provincial initiatives and advisory groups, including the PEI Women and Gender Diverse Islanders Health Council and the PEI Alliance for Mental Wellbeing’s Research Advisory Table.
Outside of work, Mary-Ann is a proud wife, mom to three children, and a Girl Guides volunteer – inspired by their mission to empower girls and young women.
Robyn Kydd holds a Master of Science in Community Health and Epidemiology (College of Medicine, University of Saskatchewan), a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (Western College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Saskatchewan), and a Bachelor of Science in Biology (University of Victoria).
Robyn has conducted research and taught in the field of public health epidemiology for over fifteen years. She has experience conducting and contributing to research studies and evaluation projects on a wide variety of topics including applied health research, social epidemiology, alcohol epidemiology, reproductive and sexual health, and zoonotic diseases.
Before joining the team in 2017, Robyn worked as an Epidemiology Research and Teaching Fellow in the Department of Preventive and Social Medicine (University of Otago, Dunedin, NZ) for seven years. During this time, she collaborated on research projects with the Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development (Cohort) Study, co-authored a report describing the alcohol-attributable burden of disease and injury in New Zealand, and taught a variety of undergraduate and graduate epidemiology classes.
She brings to the team considerable knowledge in epidemiology, public health, program evaluation, survey development, systematic and scoping reviews, comparative risk assessment methodology, data analysis and biostatistics.
Kaleigh is the Administrative Assistant at the UPEI Center for Health and Community Research. She supports the coordination of administrative operations and research projects for the team.
She holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from UPEI and a master’s degree in Global Affairs from UPEI and the Universidad Rey Juan Carlos in Madrid. During her studies, she placed an emphasis on climate change and adaptation and hopes to explore further the negative implications of climate change when considering various social determinants of health.
Kate Kelly holds a PhD in Interdisciplinary Studies (University of New Brunswick), a Master of Arts in Cognitive Psychology (University of Toronto, funded by a SSHRC Canada Graduate Scholarship), and Bachelor of Arts (Honours Psychology) from the University of PEI. Her doctoral work investigated the use of social media-based patient navigation to support caregivers of children with complex care needs.
Prior to joining the team in 2024, Kate was a Post Doctoral Fellow in the Department of Applied Human Sciences at UPEI, where she led two projects on vaccine confidence (funded by the Public Health Agency of Canada) and the development of a province-wide community navigation program for families with young children. Her research interests include patient navigation, patient-oriented research, knowledge syntheses, and knowledge translation.
Alexandra (Alex) is the Data Scientist at UPEI’s Centre for Health and Community Research (CHCR), where she provides guidance and support related to the use of administrative data from the Secure Island Data Repository.
Before joining CHCR, Alex worked as an epidemiologist at the Public Health Agency of Canada and an environmental health analyst at ICES Western. Her areas of work included: spatial epidemiology, health services use and access to care research, and public health surveillance of child welfare.
She holds a MSc in Health Geography from the department of Geography, Environment and Geomatics (University of Ottawa), a certificate in Population Health Data Analysis (University of Victoria) and a BSc in Biology (Saint Mary’s University).
