Dajae Post, who earned her BSN from UMSL in 2020, is a clinic manager at Affinia Healthcare. (Photo by Derik Holtmann)
Hometown: St. Louis
Degree: BS in Nursing, 2020
Current Position: Clinic manager at Affinia Healthcare
Fun Fact: In her free time, Post is also a rapper and R&B singer who performs locally under the name Dae Smooth.
Dajae Post hasn’t always had access to healthcare, and throughout her life, she’s known many people in a similar position. From an early age, Post knew she wanted to pursue a career in community-centered healthcare but wasn’t exactly sure how to go about doing so.
“There’s such a great need for facilities that are focused on public health,” Post says. “That’s how I got started – because I was one of the patients.”
Post credits UMSL’s College of Nursing with giving her the tools she needed to fulfill that mission and help her community. During her public health rotation with Associate Professor Sheila Grigsby, for instance, she completed multiple rotations in community spaces such as barbershops, where she tested blood pressure and educated patients about hypertension. The experience underscored the importance of meeting patients where they’re at.
“UMSL really showed me that healthcare can be anywhere,” she says. “It’s not limited to a hospital. It’s not limited to a clinic. If you put yourself out there and go to the places where the need is, then you can still help people. There are so many ways that public health is displayed in our daily lives that we don’t even think about.”
Post graduated with her BSN during an especially tumultuous time to be a healthcare worker, as the pandemic had just started to wreak havoc across the country. She worked on a med-surg floor at DePaul Hospital, where she saw several patients pass away from COVID-19, before going on to work as a clinic nurse at Oak Street Health. Eventually, Post found herself at Affinia Healthcare, a federally qualified health center with multiple locations in the St. Louis area. She started as a clinic nurse and was recently promoted to clinic manager. In this role, she oversees daily operations, including planning and budgeting, and also assesses patients’ conditions.
Post finds it rewarding to watch her patients grow and improve in their conditions and recognizes that even the smallest moments can have a big impact. She’s passionate about the role that community-focused healthcare plays in improving public health and has returned to the College of Nursing to speak with students about the topic.
“What I love about Affinia is that I get to serve people every day who look like me and who don’t usually have access to healthcare and the services that they might need,” Post says. “We have a full range of services to offer patients – a pharmacy, women’s health clinic, pediatrics, adult medicine, chiropractic services, dental. I just love working for Affinia because we do so much for the community.”
This story was originally published in the spring 2026 issue of UMSL Magazine. If you have a story idea for UMSL Magazine, email magazine@umsl.edu.
