Cheri A. Pies

Cheri Pies (Cheramy Anne Pies; November 26, 1949 – July 4, 2023) was an American academic known for her work on parenthood and lesbians. She was a professor emerita of public health at the University of California, Berkeley.

Early life and education Pies as born in Los Angeles and grew up in the San Fernando Valley of California. She graduated from Birmingham High School, and then received her bachelor's degree from Berkeley in 1971. In 1976 she obtained a master's degree in social work from Boston University. She later received a second master's degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and went on to earn a Ph.D. from the same institution in 1993. Starting in the 1980s she led workshops and programs for lesbians considering parenting. She coordinated projects centered on lesbians who had been artificially inseminated, and coordinated research examining the relevance of HIV/AIDS in lesbian mothers. She later examined the impact of cash incentives when decisions about reproduction are being considered. She collaborated with Michael Lu at Berkeley to study health conditions in financially-challenged neighborhoods.

In 1985, she published Considering Parenthood: A Workbook for Lesbians, one the first ever parenting books for lesbians published in the United States.

Pies died of cancer in 2023.

Selected publications

Honors and awards In 2018 a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recognized Pies with the Maternal and Child Health Bureau Director’s Award for her work in improving access to public health.