Southeast > About > Staff > Elaine Dowdy Melvin

Elaine Dowdy Melvin, B.A., MPH — Deputy Director of Training/Technical Assistance

Elaine Dowdy Melvin serves CSAP's Southeast CAPT as Deputy Director of Training and Technical Assistance and State Coordinator for North Carolina and South Carolina. Elaine has a Bachelor of Arts from Benedict College in Columbia, South Carolina, a Master of Public Health from the University of South Carolina in Columbia, and thirty years’ experience in human services. She has served as Director of Prevention Programs for the South Carolina Department of Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse Services (SCDAODAS). In this role, Ms. Melvin directed and supervised alcohol, tobacco and other drug prevention programming, funding, technical assistance and consultation for SCDAODAS and its system of 34 county-level agencies that have prevention programs. She was Director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Fighting Back Project in Columbia, South Carolina, and directed the implementation of this multi-county community based prevention project for six years. Fighting Back brought together partnerships and cooperation toward substance abuse prevention among City of Columbia leaders, human service agencies, community and civic organizations. She has also worked as an Education Program Consultant for the South Carolina Department of Education and as a Project Developer for the South Carolina Commission on Alcohol and Drug Abuse. Ms. Melvin has been a consultant/grant reviewer for numerous agencies including: the US Department of Education; the US Department of Health and Human Services, Center for Substance Abuse Prevention; and the US Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice Prevention and Delinquency.