Nutrition and Dietetics Alumni Society Board Candidates

Carla Addison ’03

Carla Addison received her B.S. in Nutrition from Penn State in 2003. She is currently working as a research food nutritionist at Heinz North America in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she provides recommendations for the company’s consumer products health and wellness strategies.  She is also a part-time sports nutrition consultant at the Oxford Athletic Club in Wexford, Pennsylvania 

Previously, Addison worked for the Highmark insurance company to provide wellness classes at the Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh (JCC). She also volunteers to provide nutrition education for a JCC program called Growing Strong Girls. Her first job in Pittsburgh was with the Family Health Council, where she helped start the Power Up! Program, an in-school nutrition education program for the Pittsburgh public school district students, parents, and food service employees. 

Addison is a member of the SCAN and Dietitians in Public Health Dietetic Practice Groups (DPGs). She enjoys outdoor activities such as running, hiking, and rowing. She has a wonderful family who lives on a farm in Westmoreland County, which is where she grew up and still visits often.

Joeleen Davis ’01

Joeleen Davis received her B.S. in Nutrition from Penn State in December 2001 and completed her dietetic internship and M.S. degree at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. From 2004 to 2007, Davis worked as a clinical dietitian at Mount Nittany Medical Center in State College, Pennsylvania, where she regularly had Penn State Nutrition students work with her in a volunteer capacity in order to learn about clinical nutrition.

Davis currently works as a clinical dietitian at Mercy Hospital in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
She is a member of the American Dietetic Association, Sports Cardiovascular and Wellness Nutritionists, the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition, and the Penn State Alumni Association. She served as a mentor to a Nutrition student in the College of Health and Human Development Mentoring Program from 2005 to 2006.

Joseph (Ty) Gagne ’75

Joseph “Ty” Gagne serves as president of DBL Values, LLC, which he founded with his wife in 2004. Prior to that, he worked for Marriott and then Sodexho, most recently as senior vice president and president of NANA Management Services, a partnership between Sodexho and Alaskan Native Corporation, where he was responsible for developing new business units.

Currently, Gagne takes a equity interest with Native American tribes to develop a Natural Beef Program and other food brands. He also volunteers for Executive Service Corporation, which provides low-cost executive consulting services to nonprofits in New England.

In addition to his B.S. in Nutrition from Penn State, Gagne received his M.S. from the University of Pittsburgh in 1984.

Jennifer Lynn-Pullman ’98

Jennifer Lynn-Pullman received her B.S. in Nutrition from Penn State in 1998 and an M.A. in Nutrition Education from Immaculata University in 2004. She is employed as the dietitian for the Jeanes Hospital’s Bariatric Program in Philadelphia. Prior to this appointment she was employed as a clinical dietitian for Jeanes Hospital, which is part of the Temple University Health System in Philadelphia.

Lynn-Pullman also has served as an adjunct faculty member at Holy Family University since 2004. Previous work experiences include Genesis Health Care and the WIC program with NORTH Inc. She is a member of the American Dietetic Association (ADA) and the Philadelphia Dietetic Association and belongs to ADA’s Weight Management and SCAN Dietetic Practice Groups (DPGs).

Lynn-Pullman’s special interests are in the areas of obesity, weight management, and physical fitness. In her spare time she teaches group fitness classes at the Northeast Philadelphia YMCA, where she also serves on the Aquatics Committee. She lives in Philadelphia with her husband (Scott Pullman ’96 HRIM) and their son Tyler.

Domingo Piñero ’98g

Domingo J Piñero joined the Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health at New York University as an assistant professor in August 2002. He received his B.S. in Nutrition in 1986 from the Universidad Central de Venezuela; his M.S. in Nutrition in 1991 from the Universidad Simón Bolívar, Venezuela; and his Ph.D. in Nutrition with a Minor in Demography in 1998 from Penn State. From 1998 to 2002 he was a research assistant professor at the G.M. Leader Family Laboratory for Alzheimer’s Disease Research in the Neuroscience Department of the Penn State College of Medicine. 

Dr. Piñero’s research interests are in pediatric nutrition in Latinos; especially pediatric obesity, and iron nutrition and cognitive development. He is most interested in multidisciplinary approaches to the solution of nutritional problems early in life. His current research centers on the prevention of child and adolescent obesity in the Latino community. Dr. Piñero earned a New York University Research Challenge Fund Award in 2004 for his pediatric obesity prevention collaborative research at Bellevue Hospital and was the recipient of the 2007 Teaching Excellence Award of the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development at New York University.

Natalie Rocchino ’82

Natalie Rocchino is a full-time graduate student in a master’s degree program in nutrition education in Nutrition Education/Registered Dietitian at Immaculata University. She also serves as an administrative associate at Abington Memorial Hospital Emergency Trauma Center, where she assists emergency medicine physicians, medical residents, and nurses and is a mentor for Emergency Trauma Center mentoring program.

Rocchino received her B.S. in Nutrition with an emphasis in Medical Dietetics in 1982. She received teacher certification from Gwynedd Mercy College in Springhouse, Pennsylvania, completing her student teaching in the Wissahickon School District in Ambler, Pennsylvania.

From 1997 to 2002, Rocchino taught in the Abington School District as a per diem/long-term substitute teacher for kindergarten through sixth grade and in the Upper Dublin School District as a first grade teacher and summer program teacher/coordinator of a first grade reading program.

Rocchino enjoys running and is a mentor for the Penn State Alumni Association’s mentoring program.

Christine Lewis Taylor ’77g, ’86g

Christine Lewis Taylor is a scholar in nutrition at the Institute of Medicine, The National Academies in Washington, DC. In that capacity, she is currently responsible for oversight of the Dietary Reference Intake review process. Previously, Taylor spent twenty years at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), most recently as senior advisor to the Commissioner on Food and Drugs on International Nutrition Policy. In that role, she served two years in Geneva with the World Health Organization, where she developed an international consultancy for nutrient risk assessment. From 2000 to 2004 she held the position of director of the Office of Nutritional Products, Labeling and Dietary Supplements, an office responsible for scientific review, regulation policy and enforcement/compliance activities. The five program areas overseen by the Office included:  food labeling and nutrition claims; food standards; dietary supplements; infant formula; and medical foods. She also served as head of the United States delegation to the Codex Committee on Food Labeling.

Taylor received her M.S. and Ph.D. in Nutrition from Penn State in 1977 and 1986, respectively, and her B.S. in Biology from the University of Connecticut in 1974. She is a member of the American Society for Nutrition and the American Dietetic Association and a member of the board of editors of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association.

Barbara Winters ’77, ’80g, ’93g

Barbara Winters received three degrees in Nutrition from Penn State: her bachelor’s degree in 1977, her master’s degree in 1980, and her Ph.D. in 1993. After completing her bachelor’s degree, her interest in community nutrition led her to pursue her master’s degree with Dr. Helen Wright. After completing that degree, she focused on clinical nutrition, working as a director of the Dietary Department and chief clinical dietitian at a hospital and a nursing home. After seven years of this work Winters returned to Penn State and received her Ph.D., this time working with Dr. Robert Yeh. Her research was directed at understanding the efficacy of omega-3 fatty acids in infant formulas.

Winters completed post-doctoral work at Harvard, where she studied the effect of omega-3 fatty acids on cancer.  This launched a great interest in nutrition and cancer and clinical trials. From 1994 to 2002, Winters served as program leader of the Translational Research Program, senior research scientist, at the American Health Foundation in New York City, a nonprofit research foundation focused on preventive health.  While there, she also served as a co-investigator and national study coordinator of the Women's
Intervention Nutrition Study (WINS), a longitudinal study sponsored by the National Institutes of Health.  In 2002, Winters became an assistant professor and didactic program director at Marywood University.  In 2004, she assumed her current role of Senior Program Manager, Global Nutrition and Health, for Campbell Soup Company.

Winters has given nearly two dozen presentations at national and international conferences and written more than forty reports and abstracts, and written journal articles and several book chapters.