Valeria Sabaté returned to AAAS as its Senior Media & Public Affairs Manager in July 2022.
Valeria has many years of experience in media relations, public relations, external communications and crisis communications in industries such as health care, public health, publishing and science associations.
Before joining AAAS, Valeria was the Senior Communications Specialist, Research & Innovation at the Children's National Hospital, the No. 5 children's hospital in the nation. While at the hospital, based in Washington, D.C., she helped promote scientific literature and medical innovations and served as the key liaison to the Children's National Research Institute—the first in the nation dedicated to pediatric research. As part of her work, she led science communications strategies to boost the visibility of the research and national reputation. She also served as an on-call staff, ensuring accurate and timely external and internal responses guided by a comprehensive corporate and crisis communications plan.
Valeria joined Children's National Hospital in 2021, but she served up to five years at AAAS before that. During her first time at AAAS, Val was the Senior Communication Associate and Intl. Communications Lead at the Science Press Package team, which promotes findings related to forthcoming Science family journal papers to a global press.
Before AAAS, Valeria worked for the Pan American Health Organization, which also serves as the Regional Office for the Americas of the World Health Organization (WHO). Through external communications strategies, she helped increase awareness of public health concerns, including emerging diseases such as the Zika outbreak in 2015-2016.
Valeria holds a Master's degree in communications with a dual concentration in public and media relations and political communications from Johns Hopkins University. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts with a double major in Broadcast, print and online media, and advertising and public relations. She also has a minor in political science.