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Desiree A. Díaz, PhD, APRN, FNP-BC, CNE, CHSE-A, ANEF, FSSH, FAAN

One of the world’s leading healthcare simulation education experts, Professor Desiree A. Díaz has spent more than a decade seeking to improve healthcare disparities through simulation education. She believes it is important not just to teach skills and responses, but also to explore the thoughts behind those actions. Her research focuses on combining cutting-edge simulation technology with the human emotion of empathy to foster more culturally competent providers and ultimately improve care for underserved patient populations, including the incarcerated, English language learners and the LGBTQ+ community. Currently, her research focuses on improving maternal and newborn care in ethnically diverse populations. Her research has been widely published and presented, and her creative and innovative simulations have helped establish best practices and revolutionized training, such as the creation of the world’s first correctional nursing simulation van to train prison nurses. Díaz is also committed to global health, and has helped lead several UCF interprofessional medical outreach trips to South America, Africa and the Caribbean.

Kimberly Navarro, PhD, RN, CNM, WHNP-BC

Kimberly Navarro is a Certified Nurse Midwife and Board Certified Women’s Health Nurse Practitioner who is passionate about providing high quality care, ameliorating maternal health racial inequities, combating maternal mortality and promoting the normalcy of pregnancy. She has over 15 years of experience in women’s health and has been involved in serving her community and providing education and healthcare services domestically and globally. Navarro’s commitment to underserved communities began as a student nurse partnering with nonprofits and churches to provide free health screenings and education. She has worked in federally funded health clinics in New Jersey and California and served as a frontline healthcare provider during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2023 she earned a PhD in Global Leadership and Change from Pepperdine University, where she completed her dissertation on the experiences of Black mothers with high-quality maternal care with Black midwives.