Miriam Vishniac – Founder and President

Dr. Miriam Vishniac, MPP, PhD, started this website in July 2021 to share the information she compiled during her doctoral research and is one of the few academic experts on incarcerated menstruation in the U.S. Her doctoral dissertation, The New Correctional Afterthought: Menstruation and Incarceration in the U.S.A., focuses on access to menstrual products and menstrual discrimination in federal and state women’s prisons and is now available online. Her work has been cited in academic publications such as Feminism & Psychology and Criminology & Public Policy as well as in advocacy reports and news media such as the Guardian and the LA Times. Miriam received her PhD in Social Policy from the University of Edinburgh in 2025, Master in Public Policy with a focus in civil rights from the George Washington University in 2018, and her Bachelor of the Arts in Biochemistry from Oberlin College in 2010.

Kayelin Tiggs – Founder and Treasurer

Kayelin Tiggs, M.A. is an independent researcher and menstrual equity organizer whose work confronts the criminalization and control of menstruation within institutional systems. She is the founder of the Ohio Coalition for Menstrual Equity, a statewide effort fighting the use of menstrual deprivation as punishment and advocating for bodily autonomy and dignity.

Kayelin holds a Master of Arts in Applied Psychology from the University of Cincinnati, where her research exposed period poverty and reproductive injustice in Ohio’s carceral system. That work led to her authorship of HB29, legislation that makes it illegal to withhold menstrual products as a form of punishment or discrimination in all Ohio correctional facilities.

She works as a Program Manager in the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory’s 711th Human Performance Wing and serves as Lead of the Women’s Initiative Team at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where she is investigating menstrual management practices among active-duty service women in austere environments. She also serves as a strategist to the Mayor of Dayton, Ohio, bringing movement-driven analysis into local policy and governance. 

Regan Moss – Founder and Secretary

Regan Moss, MPH, (Columbia University ’24) is a second-year doctoral student in social, behavioral, and population sciences at Tulane University. At Tulane, she is a fellow with the Newcomb Institute, the PI of Tulane’s site for Justice-Involved Women and Children Cross-Center Collaborative, a Doctoral Leader with the Center of Excellence in Maternal Child Health, an instructor in the College in Prison Program and a researcher with the Mary Amelia Center for Women’s Health Equity Research.  Her research integrates social epidemiology, feminist theory, and behavioral science to examine how cultural ideas of morality and criminality surrounding m/otherhood and womanhood shape reproductive and maternal (mental) health inequities in the Deep South and Gulf South of the US through social and structural factors. She examines the embodiment of social inequities and normative discourses through maternal and reproductive psychology frameworks on maternal and reproductive identities and experiences of womanhood, m/otherhood, and health events.  

Regan has worked on menstruation and carcerality since 2020 through service and research. In 2021, she launched a study on menstruation in AL facilities following ADOC handbook changes, which was published in the Correctional Care (CoCare) magazine, Feminism and Psychology, Kick Cramps’s Ass podcast, and presented at the American Public Health Association as well as several other national conferences including Take Root and Collective Power. She co-authored the Periods in Prisons Curriculum as a former Board member of PERIOD., alongside the Thurman Perry Foundation. She is the current Principal Investigator of the study Menstruation and Incarceration: Navigating Menstrual Health, Menstrual Healthcare, & Period Poverty within Prisons, Jails, and Youth Detention Facilities in the Southeastern United States which is accompanied by the study board – Community Action Network for Period Justice in the Prison System. As an active member of the Cross-Center Collaborative for Justice-Involved Women and Children, Regan has co-authored briefs and manuscripts focused on reproductive health issues in the prison system. 

Jennifer Blemur – Vice President

Jennifer Blemur, Esq, is a graduate of the David A. Clarke School of Law. She is an advocate for change and a voice for the unheard. Her passion lies in fostering opportunity and success for marginalized communities.

Kate Sheppard

Dr. Kate Sheppard, PhD. holds a BA from Pomona College in mathematical economics and a PhD. in economics from the University of Maryland, College Park. Currently part time Senior Instructor at the University of Akron teaching undergraduate and graduate macroeconomics. Kate also volunteers for Kulture Kids and Cuyahoga Health Access Partnership. Kate has been on the faculty at Skidmore College, the College of Wooster and, through a Fulbright Scholarship in Bulgaria in 1995-96, Sofia University and The University of National and World Economics. Kate has many years of non-profit experience including General Manager of the Contemporary Youth Orchestra (2008-2014) and Regional Manager for Habitat for Humanity, International for the Mideast Region (1998-1999).