Contributor

Rajiv Narayan

Loser (of 100+ lbs.) committed to paying forward the privilege of good health.

Since losing 100 lbs. 6 years ago, Rajiv has been passionate about obesity policy, public health, and wellness. The question that guides his work is: How can I pay forward the privilege of good health?

Rajiv Narayan is a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar at the University of Oxford completing an MSc in Medical Anthropology and a recent graduate of UC Davis, where he was a Regents Scholar and elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Rajiv is also a Contributing Curator to Upworthy, where he has driven over 85 million pageviews to meaningful content in the areas of healthcare reform, food and wellness and more.

Rajiv has worked in policy and program evaluation firm Social Policy Research Associates and healthcare reporting at Close Concerns. In college he was the Senior Fellow for Health Policy at the Roosevelt Institute Campus Network, a platform from which he both worked with and represented students across the country. Rajiv also completed a fellowship year with the Center for American Progress program Young People For, where he was trained in organizing and progressive leadership development. Rajiv worked on an urban farm in Milwaukee, interned at the California State Assembly, and taught classes on the Social Theory of Eating Disorders at UC Davis. He has researched obesity legislation in Argentina, food stamps in California, the racial dynamics of obesity policy in Southern States, and fat acceptance activism in California. He has written for Policy Mic,The California Aggie, Next New Deal, and the Huffington Post. Rajiv is an avid social media user, and was invited by the White House to live-tweet the 2013 State of the Union Address. In his spare time, Rajiv enjoys long-distance running and hiking; he completed his first full marathon and climbed Yosemite’s Half-Dome in 2013.