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Haya Alshaabi - 2024
My name is Haya Alshaabi and I was born and raised in Damascus, Syria. I graduated from the University of Vermont with a biology major. As an undergraduate student, I conducted research in Dr. Brian Cunniff's laboratory at UVM Cancer Center where I investigated the influence of Miro1 mediated mitochondrial positioning inside the cells on cellular activities including cell migration and redox signaling. I was also an intern in the Office of Chief Medical Examiner of Vermont where I participated in performing autopsies and writing reports. Besides my research and internship, I am a licensed EMT and have volunteered in multiple departments in UVM Medical Center. Away from work and studying, I love writing journals, drawing, and cooking. I also enjoy swimming, hiking, and long walks.
Raven Bennett - 2024
Raven (she/her/hers) grew up in Santa Monica, California. She moved to the Philadelphia area to attend Swarthmore College, where she majored in Psychology and minored in Educational Studies, graduating in 2017. During her time at Swarthmore, Raven spearheaded the creation of several novel sexual violence prevention education programs, first as a student and later as a staff member. As an undergraduate, Raven also partnered with the UCLA Rape Treatment Center to create a summer program for local youth. Raven complemented her applied work with research and wrote an honors research thesis on the efficacy of two interventions meant to positively change attitudes towards sexual violence.
While working with survivors, Raven developed an interest in the connection between trauma and health outcomes and started volunteering at a nearby hospital serving a city disproportionately impacted by violence. Raven then completed her post-baccalaureate premedical studies at Bryn Mawr College, where she co-coordinated the LGBTQIA+ Health Interest Group. Raven is excited to continue her journey to becoming a trauma-informed physician by learning about social determinants of health and health disparities as an Urban Health Scholar. She also looks forward to serving local and urban underserved communities and being in community with her fellow Scholars.
Jada English - 2024
Jada was born in New Orleans, Louisiana and moved to Houston, Texas when she was two years old. She returned to New Orleans when she attended Xavier University of Louisiana, a historically black college, where she studied Biology. At Xavier, Jada worked as a medical scribe in the emergency room at Ochsner Medical Center where she was tasked with documenting patient information and working directly under physicians. Here, Jada saw the health disparities that afflicted the greater New Orleans community including lack of access to healthcare and lack of preventive measures in terms of chronic diseases. Jada also volunteered at Compassus Hospice Center where she visited patients with terminal illnesses and provided emotional support for patients and their family members. She is very excited about joining Urban Health Scholars because she wants to learn more about health disparities that effect subgroups of urban communities. She is also looking forward to working in a team with a group of her colleagues that have similar interests. Jada is passionate about preventive medicine in hopes to decrease the number of chronic diseases and dependence on medication. She is also passionate about mental health in urban communities due to the increased risks residents have when it comes to anxiety and depression. Outside of school, I love baking, cooking and staying connected with friends and family.
Adam G. Fasman - 2024
Adam grew up in Newton, Massachusetts. He graduated from Columbia University in 2019 with a double major in Biology and Medicine, Literature, and Society–a major focused on looking at medicine through a humanistic lens. While at Columbia, he volunteered as an EMT on the Columbia University Emergency Medical Service, providing no-cost emergency treatment and hospital transport to the Columbia area. This position allowed him to serve a wide variety of patients from different backgrounds, as well as gave him firsthand exposure to the disparities present in the New York City emergency room system. Adam went on to lead the service as Director in 2018. In addition, Adam worked for the Lang Youth Medical Program, teaching a class of 12th Grade students from Washington Heights and Inwood in an extracurricular medicine and public health program on topics including college essay writing, sexual health, and wellness. After graduating, he won a Fulbright Grant and moved to Santiago de Compostela, Spain. He worked as an English teaching assistant in the high school of a nearby town, developing content-based language lessons to use with his students. He is excited to be working with Urban Health Scholars and is interested in researching new ways to expand access to essential healthcare services for underserved populations.
Lily J. Greene - 2024
Lily grew up in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire—a small rural town on Lake Winnipesaukee. She attended her freshman year of college at the University of Vermont in Burlington before transferring to Boston University to conclude her studies. At BU, Lily pursued a major in Biology with a minor in Human Physiology. As an undergraduate, she spent two years pursuing basic science research in immunometabolism and completed a thesis on the development and validation of immortalized primary neutrophils for use in cell culture studies. After graduating, Lily joined the Hotamışlıgil Laboratory at the Harvard School of Public Health as a research assistant. She continued to study immunometabolism in the context of two projects focused on macrophages and the exocrine pancreas.
Outside of the lab, Lily volunteered at a hospice home in Cambridge, Massachusetts where she visited patients and families. She also spent weekends at St. Francis House, a day shelter in Boston, Massachusetts serving adults experiencing poverty and homelessness. Volunteering at St. Francis House illustrated the many unique challenges and health disparities facing unhoused and urban populations, reaffirming Lily’s desire to work with underserved communities as a medical student. Lily is exceptionally excited to join UHS and learn more about urban health and systems of inequality—and how physicians can be agents for change in improving these practices.
Ayodele K. Maja - 2024
Ayo grew up in Wynnewood, Pennsylvania, just outside of Philadelphia. He has spent the past six years living in Philadelphia, spending the first four years attending the University of Pennsylvania studying Neuroscience with a minor in Health Care Management. As an undergraduate, he spent his extracurricular time teaching health topics to elementary school students in West Philadelphia and volunteering in a service group that mentors fourth to seventh grade students through dance education. After graduating, he spent the next two years serving as an AmeriCorps VISTA member, through which he continued to work at UPenn. Under the University’s community partnerships center, he worked with the GEAR UP program to help facilitate and coordinate a tutoring and post-secondary success program for West Philadelphia high school students. During these gap years, he also worked as a volunteer at Penn Presybterian Hospital. Ayo has also been very passionate about mentorship, with a primary focus on supporting underrepresented minorities who wish to pursue the field of healthcare. He is also committed to uplifting and supporting underserved communities throughout his time in medical school and beyond. He is very excited to be a part of Urban Health Scholars, a great opportunity to gain experience working with underserved populations and learn more about how to be a strong advocate for patients in urban communities.
Daniela Orozco Rendon - 2024
Daniela was born in Tulua, Colombia. However, she spent the majority of her life in Houston, Texas with her parents. She attended the University of Houston and graduated in December 2019 with a Bachelor of Science in Biology and a minor in Medicine in Society. During her time there she was a part of the Honor’s College, a Residential Advisor and the Program Chair for her college’s Natural Science and Mathematics Student Leadership Board, where she strived to create a community within her college and with the surrounding area. As the daughter of immigrants and as she learned more about the surrounding community in Houston as well as the social determinants of health from her minor, she began to notice the struggles that many face with health care that arise from factors outside of the clinic. She went on to shadow in the Harris Health System, which are low-income clinics in the Houston area. While there she shadowed an OB-GYN and saw a variety of patients who each brought their own narrative and was drawn to the way that the physician, she shadowed, was able to cater to her patient’s needs. Something that she and her family had not always experienced in their own health care. Daniela also conducted research on Focal Segmental Glomerulosclerosis and other kidney diseases and through her work she was able to learn more about the health disparities related to kidney diseases. It was these experiences that turned her to the importance of social determinants and pushed her to seek out how she can better combat them as a physician. She is excited to build upon what she has learned and continue to better understand the patient through the Urban Health Scholar’s program and hopefully begin to do what she can to address the inequalities in the health care system. Outside of school Daniela enjoys learning to cook new meals, spending time with her cat, Lil’ Mamas, watching movies, drawing and painting.
Kevin S. Puerta Durango - 2024
Kevin was born in Medellin, Colombia but raised in Miami, Florida. He attended Florida International University where he majored in Biology and Psychology. While there his research interest included participating in treatment programs to increase the academic outcomes of pre-kindergarten age students in socioeconomically disadvantaged environments. After graduating he further pursued his interest in youth academics and became a middle school science teacher. These experiences highlighted the importance of being a positive influence on your community, and Kevin envisions himself being a physician in a community similar to the one he grew up in. As an Urban Health Scholar, he looks forward to exploring different avenues to improving access to care in immigrant and underserved communities. Additionally, he aspires to be role model to future generations, whom he believes are the key to effective long-term change. In the rare instances that he is not thinking about helping his community, Kevin enjoys playing soccer and video games.
Haider S. Ghiasuddin - 2023
Haider graduated with an undergraduate degree in English and Chemistry from Dartmouth. At Dartmouth he developed a passion for creative writing and chemistry lab work and research. His creative writing honors thesis in fiction was a recipient of the Sidney Cox Memorial Prize, and he was also awarded a Dean's Fellowship from Harvard for graduate study in Muslim and South Asian literature and history, which he pursued directly after college.
As Haider began translating his humanities education into community and volunteer work in the Greater Boston area, time spent with those facing serious illnesses and inequalities drew him back to science and medicine. Upon completing his Master's program at Harvard, he first worked as a medical scribe in primary care before working as a research technician in a Hematology-Oncology lab at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston for close to two years. During his time at Beth Israel he gained translational research experience in immunotherapy-based vaccine trials for patients with multiple myeloma and acute myeloid leukemia. More specifically, Haider took the lead in the chemical (IHC) characterization of tumors and experimental vaccines for patients enrolled in these trials in Boston and across the country, while also assisting in experimental vaccine manufacturing.
Haider is incredibly excited to join UHS, as it is his desire to help contribute to improving the practice of and access of medicine for those who are most disadvantaged and marginalized in diverse environments, and to constantly better educate himself along the way. He also hopes to continue to channel his passions for creative writing and chemistry in trying to imagine something better.
Romina Almada 
Gossweiler - 2023
Romina was born in Asunción, Paraguay and lived in Montevideo, Uruguay before moving to the United States at the age of nine. She attended NYU for college where she majored in Neural Science and interned at the Immigrant Health and Cancer Disparities Service of Memorial Sloan Kettering. After college, she completed a masters in medical physiology at Loyola University Chicago and volunteered as a medical translator. She is very interested in immigrant health and envisions working alongside immigrant communities in the future as a physician.
Jasmine A. Panton - 2023
I was born and raised in Stuart, Florida, a small beach town in the southeastern part of the state. I graduated from Harvard College in 2015 after studying History and Literature. Immediately after, I earned a Master’s degree in Bioethics from Harvard Medical School, in the inaugural class. As a Master’s student, I engaged in community outreach in Boston, interviewing locals about their relationships with health and the healthcare system. This work intimated that mobiletech could and should be leveraged to connect underserved populations to healthcare providers. Most recently, I worked as a Clinical Associate at a primary care-focused, telehealth startup based in New York City. My management of our efforts to become accredited with the National Committee for Quality Assurance as a Patient-Centered Medical Home made me particularly interested in applying lessons from advanced primary care to community outreach as a Geisel student and Urban Health Scholar. My current research interests include telehealth, maternal health, advanced primary care models, health inequity, and qualitative, narrative-based research methods such as photovoice. I am so excited to continue exploring community-oriented, servicebased learning as a member of the Urban Health Scholars.
Paolo Ramirez - 2023
Paolo was born and raised in Pasadena in Los Angeles County. He attended undergraduate at DePaul University in the heart of Chicago, where he majored in Neuroscience and completed research in peptide based chemistry. Paolo also had the opportunity to minor in Community Service Studies. In his Community Service Studies program, he worked with local nonprofit homeless shelters and arts programs while learning about nonprofit management. These experiences exposed him to the variety of healthcare issues that affect urban and disadvantaged communities. Paolo also had the opportunity to complete medical volunteering abroad in Nicaragua with DePaul University. Following undergrad, he became an Emergency Medical Technician in Los Angeles while working as a barista at a coffee shop. Paolo hopes to learn how medical professionals continually work towards addressing issues in their own community and enact change through UHS.
Katherine F. Quarles Stephens - 2023
Born in New York City and raised in Montana, I returned to the east to study philosophy at Smith College. While in school I ran cross country and track, did research in a biochemistry lab, and volunteered as a middle school track coach. After graduating I worked as an EMT in Boston, seeing disparities in healthcare up close and feeling frustrated at my inability to change them. Urban health appealed to me in its approach to tackling determinants of health beyond the usual scope of medical practice. When not thinking about how to destroy systems of inequity, I enjoy running, climbing, skiing, and fermenting foods.
Isabelle C. Tersio - 2023
Isabelle was born in Port-au-Prince, Haïti and grew up in Boca Raton, Florida. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2018, where she majored in neuroscience. Isabelle devoted most of her free time during undergrad to teaching young students self-expression and dance, as well as working as a farm intern in West Philadelphia. She went on to spend her year after graduation teaching gardening, cooking, and nutrition at a charter school in Washington, D.C. Through these opportunities and her own experience, Isabelle is passionate about using an interdisciplinary approach to address barriers to health faced by underserved communities. She is excited to be a member of Urban Health Scholars, where she is confident she will be able to cultivate a deeper understanding of the social determinants of health in an urban setting and how to organize change from the ground-up. Isabelle aspires to start effecting these changes through the youth!
Sean M. Turner - 2023
Sean was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. Following high school, he served in the Army from 2002-2013 which entailed a mix of active duty and guard time including deployments to Iraq, Kuwait, and Afghanistan. In 2013 he switched to and is still serving in the Air Force as a TACP. During this time period he also worked as a firefighter and/or paramedic in Cincinnati and Indianapolis. He graduated from Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis in 2018. Outside of Geisel Sean enjoys spending time with his daughter Frankie, playing hockey, and enjoying the wilderness of the Upper Valley.
Irene V. Vargas - 2023
Irene was born in Trujillo, Peru. When she was 10 years old, she immigrated with her family to Miami, Florida. She began her undergraduate studies at the Honors Program in Miami Dade College and consequently transferred to Johns Hopkins University. She graduated with a degree in Biology in 2016. After having experienced the challenges that many immigrants face, she became extensively involved with the immigrant and undeserved communities in Baltimore. During her time at Hopkins, she was also a volunteer and program fellow with Health Leads, a non-profit organization that helps connect low-income patients and families with local resources in the community. Here, she realized the importance of addressing the social determinants of health and the impact of being an advocate for patients. Irene is very excited to be an Urban Health Scholar because it offers the opportunity to continue learning about the challenges that urban underserved populations face. She hopes to gain the skills necessary to be a catalyst of change in order to improve patient health while reducing inequalities. Outside of Geisel, she enjoys painting, reading, spending time with friends and exploring the Upper Valley.
Syed Rakin Ahmed - 2022
Despite being born and raised in an extremely low-income family in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Rakin never allowed his financial underprivilege to serve as a mitigatory factor in his passions. During his undergraduate years at Dartmouth where he studied on full financial aid, he was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi, majoring with High Honors in Biomedical Engineering (BME) and double-minoring in Economics and Applied Mathematics as a member of the Class of 2018. He also involved himself extensively in research, debating and in the service of people. As part of his research, he attained all possible competitive research grants he was eligible for at Dartmouth and lead-authored a paper published in the Journal of Biomedical Optics. His passion for research led him to pursuing a dual MD-PhD, with the PhD in the uniquely interdepartmental Biophysics program at Harvard, to which he was accepted, in addition to being accepted to Geisel through the competitive BME Early Assurance program from Thayer School. During his undergraduate years, outside of extensive shadowing and oncology research, Rakin assisted in hospitals and rehabilitation centers in Dhaka, Barisal and in Hanover. Extensive involvement in debating over the years led him to represent Team Bangladesh at the World Schools Debating Championship 2013, in Turkey and 2014, in Thailand, and Dartmouth at the World Universities Debating Championship 2016, in Greece. In addition, his desire for a deep involvement with religious life and the intersection of identity, race, faith and social justice was manifested through his frequent participation in inter-faith and social justice centered activities and his leadership of an alternative spring trip directed at investigating these issues at Dartmouth. The opportunity of being able to bring healthcare and technology to marginalized and medically underserved individuals is one he certainly aspires to realize, in the long-run.
Caroline D. Andrew - 2022
Caroline grew up in Burlington, Vermont. For undergraduate, she attended Boston College where she majored in nursing. While in Boston, she worked as a nursing assistant on an acute locked psychiatric floor at the VA. She also worked as a nursing assistant at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center on an inpatient Oncology unit. After college, Caroline became an intensive care unit registered nurse at NYU Langone Medical Center. During her time at NYU Langone Medical Center (NYULMC), she became part of the Ebola team; this was a group of four ICU nurses who would care for any potential Ebola patients admitted to NYULMC. She also attended New York University Acute Care Nurse Practitioner Program prior to transitioning to the pre-medical track. While in New York City, Caroline volunteered on an urban farm as well as taught free nutrition/cooking classes at a local food pantry. Caroline is excited to be a part of Urban Health Scholars because she is committed to learning how medical care is delivered in urban communities and she hopes to practice medicine in an urban setting in Bita has spent part of the past 23 years moving around the world: being born in Toronto (Canada) and spending around 5 years of her childhood there, her teenage years in Tehran (Iran), completing her undergraduate degree in biophysics back at the University of Toronto, and finally studying medicine at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth (U.S.). During her post-secondary studies, she has been involved in quantitative medical imaging and machine learning studies. Outside of research, she has pursued her passion for enhancing diversity and reducing healthcare disparities in eclectic ways such as raising awareness and advancing research of Chronic Immunological and Neurological Diseases, developing healthy Middle Eastern recipes, addressing myths and stigmas about cancer, and mentoring disadvantaged undergraduate students applying to medical schools. As a co-director of Urban Health Scholars, she aspires to learn how to be a catalyst for positive change within urban underserved communities in the future.
Jay Bader - 2022
Jay grew up in a suburb of Minneapolis, Minnesota, and graduated from MIT in June 2017 with a B.S. Chemistry, B.S. Biology, and minors in Political Science and Biomedical Engineering. After experiencing racial and speech-related bullying in high school, Jay committed much of his time to volunteering. After working with Special Olympics Track and Field athletes in high school, Jay felt an especially strong desire to help those who were misunderstood and in tough situations. As an undergraduate, he started volunteering with the Big Brothers Big Sisters program, where he mentored a 13-year-old boy and continues to mentor him during medical school. He also joined the Lean On Me anonymous texting program at MIT. If any MIT student was feeling stressed or overwhelmed, they could text Jay's phone number anonymously and have someone to talk to. His role was to lend an ear to stressed-out MIT students and to help them get through the stresses of college. Having texted students with high-functioning autism to eating disorders to emotionally-abusive parents, Jay gained a new outlook and a better understanding of the difficulties faced by people experiencing depression, stress, and mental illness.
Jay is extremely excited for UHS, because it gives him an opportunity to directly help people who are underserved and who may feel misunderstood by the public and the medical community - the disabled, LGTBQ community, inner city neighborhoods, the elderly, and the homeless. Jay hopes to use his experiences with UHS to help him better understand and advocate for the issues faced by these communities. He believes that educating physicians about these issues is vital to developing trust between patients and doctors, and one of his ultimate goals is to enact policy changes that address US health care disparities and allow for more affordable, easier access to quality health care for all people. Jay is also a representative in Geisel's Student Government where one of his main focuses is on the emotional and mental health of the medical students. On a side note, Jay enjoys singing with the Dermatones as well as playing many sports including hockey, flag football, golf, badminton, and especially billiards.
Bita Behrouzi - 2022
Bita has spent part of the past 23 years moving around the world: being born in Toronto (Canada) and spending around 5 years of her childhood there, her teenage years in Tehran (Iran), completing her undergraduate degree in biophysics back at the University of Toronto, and finally studying medicine at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth (U.S.). During her postsecondary studies, she has been involved in quantitative medical imaging and machine learning studies. Outside of research, she has pursued her passion for enhancing diversity and reducing healthcare disparities in eclectic ways such as raising awareness and advancing research of Chronic Immunological and Neurological Diseases, developing healthy Middle Eastern recipes, addressing myths and stigmas about cancer, and mentoring disadvantaged undergraduate students applying to medical schools. As a co-director of Urban Health Scholars, she aspires to learn how to be a catalyst for positive change within urban underserved communities.
Frederick Burton - 2022
Frederick was raised in Macon, Georgia. He graduated from the University of Rochester with a dual degree in Neuroscience and Psychology. During his time as an undergraduate, he held many executive positions in organizations including the Minority Association for Pre-Medical Students (MAPS). This organization is dedicated to connecting students historically underrepresented in health professional fields to reach their career goals through mentoring, community engagement, service, and professional development workshops. Serving on MAPS' executive board for three years, attending the Summer Medical and Dental Education Program at Duke University, and volunteering in the Emergency Department through the University of Rochester's "Friends of Strong" program has undoubtedly broadened Frederick's understanding of medicine and has fueled his aspiration to become a doctor. Frederick firmly believes in the importance of mentorship. This belief led to his involvement in co-founding the Minority Male Leadership Association (MMLA) and serving as programming manager to tackle educational and socio-economic disparities amongst minority men in the Rochester community. Through tutoring, professional development workshops, and mentorship at local high schools, MMLA continues to improve the graduation rates among minority males within the Rochester community. Post graduation, Frederick matriculated into the Medical/Dental Education Preparatory Program (MEDPREP) at Southern Illinois University to maximize his medical school profile. This program helped him to hone his test-taking skills, prepared him for the MCAT, and also challenged him with upper-level science enrichment courses and research opportunities. Outside of academics, Frederick enjoys listening to music, playing tennis and soccer, and reading. Frederick looks forward to being a part of the UHS team and hopes to apply the knowledge and experience he's gained through MAPS, SMDEP, MMLA, and MEDPREP to foster an environment that empowers underserved communities by providing them with resources to tackle multifaceted issues at every level of the socio-ecological model.
Roberto C. De La Rosa - 2022
Roberto was born and raised in the suburbs of Chicago and is a graduate of Brown University with a degree in Biomedical Engineering. As an undergraduate, he pursued his interests in biomedical research and engaged in the community to learn about and help alleviate disparities in healthcare settings. At the Rhode Island Free Clinic, he served as a Spanish medical interpreter and volunteer to help break language barriers and provide access to healthcare for the Providence community. He also served as a Health Leads advocate and fellow to help Rhode Island Hospital clinic and ED patients navigate through resources in the community to help address socioeconomic difficulties influencing their health. These experiences solidified the importance of addressing the social determinants of health to help address disparities in underserved urban communities. After graduating, he worked for Procured Health as a medical device analyst to help leverage clinical evidence to inform hospitals on the clinical effectiveness of medical devices across the market. As a medical student, in addition to pursuing his interests in biomedical engineering and medical devices, Roberto is interested in further educating himself on health disparities in urban environments and how he as a future physician can prepare himself to effectively address these issues throughout his career. He is excited to be a part of the Urban Health Scholars program to foster this development through service and engagement with the peers, patients, and the medical community dedicated to addressing these issues.
Falen Demsas - 2022
Falen originally hails from beautiful Asmara, Eritrea, a country coasting the Red Sea in Northeast Africa. She moved to the U.S. when she was about 10 years old, bounced around a bit before landing in Los Angeles California. Since graduating from Boston College, she has worked in primarily in education and the non-profit sector. She was a high school science teacher at both public charters and public high schools which has lent a great deal to her personal and professional growth. Most notably, she spent three years teaching high school Biology, Chemistry, and Earth Science at Lifeline Education Charter School in Compton, California. Much of what she is proud of is combating the significant lack of resources by building sustainable partnerships with community organizations and universities who would expand her students' educational experience. She was able to pilot a summer research pipeline program through which two students at LECS would conduct summer research with a mentor at the University of Southern California. Half a dozen of her former students have since pursued careers in science at various state institutions in California. She has received awards for her teaching and leadership both in California and Washington D.C.
Falen also spent her gap years working at non-profit, federally qualified health center- Mary's Center-in Washington DC as a health educator and clinical health coordinator. This work was rewarding as the patient populations varied from young kindergarteners to 90-year old "seasoned citizens"- one of her favorites being "Ms. Mattie". Ask her about Ms. Mattie next time.
Falen also obtained a Masters in Medical Science from Loyola University Chicago in May of 2017 prior to applying to medical school. At Geisel, she is currently a member of Allies of Women in Medicine, Association of Women Surgeons, the Student National Medical Association. Additionally, she is a member of the Student Government at Geisel, specifically the Medical Education Committee. She chose to join UHS because she wanted to remain connected to the community she aspires to serve in her future.
Arati Gangadharan - 2022
Arati Gangadharan is a first-year medical student at the Geisel School of Medicine who hails from Northville, Michigan. She graduated from Dartmouth College in 2018 with honors in neuroscience and a minor concentration in public policy. Much of her undergraduate education was devoted to the interdisciplinary examination of healthcare, public policy, and communal initiatives designed to address social determinants of health. Urban Health Scholars has allowed her to continue this exploration and expand her understanding of the future role she can have in urban settings as a physician and as a member of the community. She looks forward to her role as co-director of Urban Health Scholars and is excited about all that is to come. At Geisel, she is involved in research on traumatic brain injury and is also a Schweitzer Fellow, working with a fellow classmate to create a stroke awareness program that targets at-risk communities in the Upper Valley.
Angie Lee - 2022
Angie graduated from Dartmouth College with a Spanish degree. She spent her year after college working as a pediatrics research assistant in New York looking at ways to promote breastfeeding in underserved communities of Long Island. She is passionate about dance and community organizing. In her future, she would love to create strong communities for youth in an urban setting to help realize their full potentials.
Isabelle Yang - 2022
Isabelle was born in Taipei, and moved to Toronto with her family at the age of 7 where she grew up. She studied Chemistry and Physics at Harvard College but found a greater passion for community engagement and public service. She dedicated the majority of her time in college as a founding student and staff member of Y2Y Harvard Square, a non-profit organization in Cambridge, MA that provides shelter and case management services to homeless young adults ages 18-24. Isabelle played a key role in designing shelter's programs, policies, and database systems, and is excited bring her passion and skills to improve healthcare systems for vulnerable urban patient communities.