Former Members

Trevor Canty

Trevor grew up in Billings, MT, and attended the University of Notre Dame where he graduated in 2020 with a BA in Spanish and Arts and Letters Pre-Health. After graduation, he worked as an academic tutor in a variety of subjects, but specialized in the MCAT (Medical College Admission Test). Tutoring helped him find his desire to continue learning and teaching in medicine, especially in the areas of foundational biochemistry and genetics.

As a MedEd Scholar, Trevor hopes to continue tutoring and implementing learning techniques to help fellow medical students inside and outside of Geisel. His other interests include curriculum design and learning theory. Outside of medicine, he enjoys spending time hiking, running, and hanging out with his cat.

Rachael Chacko

Rachael grew up in Mechanicsburg, PA and graduated from Dartmouth College in 2021 with degrees in Computer Science and Biology. As an undergraduate, Rachael worked as a TA for the Computer Science department, where she held one-on-one sessions with students to explain challenging concepts and supervised other undergraduate TAs to ensure fair and accurate evaluation practices. From this experience, she discovered her love for teaching and mentorship and became interested in incorporating academia into her future medical career. As a Med Ed Scholar, Rachael hopes to create and evaluate digital educational resources to augment medical students’ learning and explore the integration of technological literacy into the medical curriculum.

Derek Colaizzo

Derek grew up in Cranbury, New Jersey and graduated with a BA in the History of Science from Princeton University. His research and course load focused on the history and development of western medical practices. As an undergraduate, he was a varsity swimmer and taught swim lessons for all ages and groups in the community. Following some time in a variety of fields, Derek returned to school and completed a premed post bac program at Columbia University, where he was a TA for organic chemistry. Inspired by the positive teaching environment, Derek sought to become more involved in education as a medical student. As a MedEd Scholar, Derek hopes to bring his interdisciplinary background and passion for education to critically examine and enrich medical education at Geisel. He enjoys cooking, exploring scenic areas, and playing his instruments.

Tiffany D’cruze

Tiffany D’cruze was born in Bihar, India but has lived in Lebanon, NH for most of her life. She graduated from Dartmouth College in June 2020 with a B.A. in Biology and a concentration in Human Biology. During her time as an undergraduate student, Tiffany worked in two research labs and volunteered at the Good Neighbor Health Clinic in White River Junction, VT. Following graduation, Tiffany was a research assistant in the Department of Community & Family Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center where she worked on a variety of research projects, including telemedicine, geriatrics, and food insecurity. Tiffany’s academic interests include health disparities, cancer biology, and patient advocacy. During her free time, Tiffany enjoys reading in her hammock, trying new recipes, and practicing yoga!

As a Medical Education Scholar, Tiffany hopes to further incorporate local patient and family experiences into Geisel curriculum to promote humanism in healthcare.

Jewelia Durant

Jewelia grew up in Madbury, NH and attended Plymouth State University, where she played NCAA lacrosse and majored in Biochemistry. During college, she took part in an oncology research internship at Dartmouth, where she later continued working as a lab tech during her senior year. She also spent time volunteering in the emergency department at DHMC, and as a peer tutor with the Biology and Chemistry departments at PSU. Her experiences as a mentor both in the lab and in the classroom as a tutor have inspired her interests in education and mentorship, which lead her to join the Medical Education Scholars. While at Geisel, Jewelia hopes to explore education and teaching methods within the clinical curriculum to help identify ways to improve the learning experience for students in the clinical years.

Constance Fontanet

Constance was born and spent most of her childhood in Paris, France. She graduated from Mount Holyoke College in 2016 with a BA in Biology. After graduation, she lived in Boston for 5 years. During that time, she completed her MPH in Epidemiology & Biostatistics at Boston University and worked as a Research Scientist at the Brigham and Women's Hospital Center for Healthcare Delivery Sciences. She is passionate about primary care, implementation research, refugee health, and social justice. As a MedEd scholar, Constance is interested in creating inclusive classroom environments that facilitate learning, incorporating trauma-informed care into the curriculum, and learning more about robust curriculum evaluation.

Monika Gabriele

Monika is originally from Connecticut and graduated from Dartmouth College in 2019 where she studied biochemistry and religion. During her undergraduate years, Monika worked as peer tutor, TA, and flipped classroom learning fellow in the chemistry and biology departments. After graduation, she joined the AmeriCorps and served for two years - first in rural Colorado providing academic intervention and outdoor leadership training to middle schoolers, and second at a free clinic in Providence, RI as the Clinical Operations VISTA. Having fallen in love with teaching during her experiences in undergrad and her first AmeriCorps year, Monika is excited to join MedEd scholars and to learn more about curriculum development, medical education pedagogies, and what a future in academic medicine can look like.

Soham Kale

Soham Kale is a resident of Glastonbury, CT and a class of 2021 biophysics concentrator from Brown University. In the clinic, Soham has helped patients with a broad range of social determinants, focusing on patients recovering from opioid use disorder. Furthermore, he is a strong advocate for people experiencing homelessness and those with developmental disabilities. Additionally, Soham completed his undergraduate thesis automating protein NMR spectroscopy assignment at a molecular biology lab. In his free time, he enjoys learning Spanish, urban design, and running.

Liam Locke

Liam grew up in Basalt, CO and graduated from Dartmouth College in 2021 with degrees in Neuroscience and Biological Chemistry. As an undergraduate, he ran individual and group tutoring sessions in chemistry and worked in a structural biology lab developing new drug therapies for inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. He also served as Chief Copy Editor for the Dartmouth Undergraduate Journal of Science, where he developed a passion for science communication and interdisciplinary collaboration. As a MedEd scholar, Liam hopes to further refine his teaching skills and develop visual aids and interactive resources for medical students with different learning styles.

Tim McAuliffe

Tim grew up in Wyncote, PA and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA in Chemistry and Political Science. As an undergraduate, Tim conducted research on patient decision-making and behavioral economics in preventive care, science and health communication in media, and political incivility. After graduating, he worked at Boston Consulting Group, where he collaborated with many healthcare clients. Over three years, he worked with a state government to develop their COVID response plan, a national hospital system to build their digital strategy, and a pharmaceutical company to launch a new oncology drug. As a MedEd Scholar, Tim is interested in mentorship and feedback relationships within medical schools and ongoing medical training. Outside of work and school, Tim enjoys running, reading non-fiction, and playing piano.

Phuong Pham

Phuong studied Biological Sciences at Macalester College, and then earned a Master of Science in Pharmacology at the University of Oxford. As a graduate student, she pursued her passion for immunovirology research and volunteered as a trial participant for the development of the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 vaccine. As a MedEd scholar, Phuong is interested in finding creative avenues to advocate for the academic needs of students with both visible and invisible illnesses, as well as incorporate disability cultural competency into the medical curriculum design.

Adam Schwendt

Originally from Slovakia, Adam grew up mostly in Maine and graduated from McGill University in 2019 with a degree in Neurobiology. He also completed an M.Sc. at McGill in Experimental Medicine (Cardiotoxicology). Afterwards, he worked as a data scientist and backend developer for the McGill Parasitology Institute. While at McGill, Adam enjoyed teaching students from introductory to graduate-level courses. Adam has always had a passion for teaching and has worked as a teacher in the US, Canada, and in Europe.

As a MedEd Scholar, Adam is interested in improving the structure of the curriculum and in creating opportunities for students to individualize their education to better align with their goals. Adam’s long term ambition is to help remove the many barriers that currently prevent individuals from pursuing a medical education in the US through major changes in the medical education structure. Outside of medicine, Adam loves to spend time outside with his puppy Wolfie. His favorite road to bike in the area is Tiger Town or Jericho.

Kristian Sogaard

Kristian grew up in Ridgefield, CT and graduated from Amherst College in 2019 with a degree in biology. After graduating he taught middle school science in New York City for two years. In that role he taught students, designed curriculums, and implemented new teaching methods in his school. While working Kristian also completed his Masters degree in Teaching with a concentration in secondary science.

As a Med Ed Scholar, Kristian’s aims are to optimize the order and flow of the curriculum and advocate for new data driven pedagogies to enhance learning. Kristian’s interests are in reducing health disparities in underserved communities and ensuring that medical education prepares our students to treat all patients, regardless of background.

Frida Velcani

Frida graduated from Vassar College Phi Beta Kappa with a degree in Science, Technology, & Society and a minor in Hispanic Studies. As an undergraduate, Frida was involved in scientific journalism and QI research that focused on residency training programs. She also held several teaching assistant positions on campus. Her undergraduate work culminated in a thesis where proposed technical, organizational, and personal recommendations for successful breast center microsystems. After graduation, Frida went on to work for The diaTribe Foundation, where she co-led a multi-stakeholder initiative focused on promoting new standards of care in diabetes and wrote articles on diabetes management and drug/device development. As a MedEd scholar, Frida hopes to integrate education around technological innovation and improving standards of care into the medical curriculum.

Justin Fong

Justin grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and graduated from Washington University in St. Louis with a BA in Neuroscience with a second major in Anthropology. Following college, he worked as a teacher, instructing high school biology and 7th grade science. While teaching, Justin directed and implemented a 7th grade science curriculum redesign and helped update the high school biology curriculum to changing California state standards. This experience has ignited a passion for curriculum design and teaching.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Justin hopes to make meaningful contributions to medical education research and to continue his passion for teaching. Outside of medicine, Justin enjoys exploring his new home of New Hampshire through hiking, biking, and running.

Briggs Carhart

Leader 2021-2022

Briggs grew up in Phoenix, AZ and graduated from the University of Arizona Honors College in 2018 with degrees in Neuroscience and Cognitive Science, Molecular and Cellular Biology, and Physiology with minors in Biochemistry, Ecology, and Evolutionary Biology. He also completed his MPH in Epidemiology with foci in infectious diseases and healthcare database statistics. At the U of A, Briggs was an Anatomy Lab TA for the College of Medicine—Tucson for multiple years. He was also a Graduate Associate for the Office of the Provost, where he helped design the new General Education curriculum for undergraduate students. Through this work, he found his passion for curriculum design and implementation as well as research for new teaching methods.

As a Med Ed Scholar, Briggs aims to research pedagogy in medicine and enhance Geisel's curricula. His interests are in public health, instruction, digital learning, curriculum assessment, and curriculum development. He also enjoys dancing and walking around the beautiful Upper Valley! Feel free to reach out to him anytime!

Alice Liu

Alice grew up in West Chester, PA and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA in Biochemistry and Sociology and MS in Chemistry. As an undergraduate, Alice served as a public speaking advisor for the Communication Within the Curriculum program at Penn. She has presented at the National Association of Communication Center (NACC) Conference, delivering a keynote on her experience coaching students in capstone research courses. As a MedEd Scholar, Alice hopes to continue utilizing her experiences and expertise in science communication to enrich medical education at Geisel.

Mariana

Mariana studied Nutrition Science at the University of California, Davis, and then earned a Master of Public Health in Chronic Disease Epidemiology at Yale University. As a graduate student, she pursued her passion for heart disease advocacy, and volunteered at two free clinics and a soup kitchen. She also researched both the cardiac complications arising from cancer treatments, in addition to the intersection between housing and health. As a MedEd scholar, Mariana is interested in mentorship and improving the training of medical students, as well as integrating nutrition, public health, advocacy, and health care delivery science into medical education.

Seth Ramin

eth grew up in Northfield, MN. He graduated from the University of Saint Thomas in 2015 with a Bachelor of Science degree (ACS Certified) in Chemistry and minors in Spanish and Biology. He then attended the University of Minnesota where he earned his Master of Public Health degree in Epidemiology (Biostatistics minor) in 2017. Seth has been involved in research and academic roles throughout his time as a student and as a post-graduate in the workforce. Some of these roles include working as a peer tutor and teaching assistant, designing a database for conducting several quality improvement studies, and conducting statistical analysis for a project assessing medical student performance on an Observed Structured Clinical Exam (OSCE). As a MedEd Scholar, Seth desires to improve the structure and flow of curricula, and to supplement current educational resources to adequately meet the diverse learning styles of the Geisel School of Medicine student body.

Jane Xu

Jane is from the small Bay Area town of Albany, California. She graduated from Dartmouth College with a degree in Neuroscience and Anthropology, as she enjoys learning about how humans learn and make decisions. During college, she volunteered at a mental health clinic for adolescents and completed clinical research at a gender health clinic, where she gained interest in learning about health disparities and the impact of social identities on health. She is excited to further explore these topics during her time in medical school.
As a MedEd scholar, she hopes to help shift the curriculum to reflect the healthcare experiences of underserved communities and make medical education more accessible to people of all backgrounds.

Aya Mahder Bashi

Aya graduated from the University of Toronto with a double major in Global Health and Physiology. She then pursued an MPH with a specialization in Epidemiology at University of Toronto’s Dalla Lana School of Public Health. During her training, Aya became very interested in understanding how healthcare systems can better address social determinants of health and work towards achieving health equity. Her work centered around the intersections of gender, violence, infectious disease and substance use. During both her undergraduate and graduate degrees, Aya worked as a peer tutor and residence advisor which allowed her to develop a passion for teaching and mentorship. As a MedEd scholar, Aya hopes to combine this passion for education and public health to explore how social determinants of health can be further integrated into the medical curriculum. She also wants to create space for discussions and trainings on trauma informed care at Geisel.

Arhem Barkatullah

Arhem grew up in Saratoga, CA and graduated from Arizona State University in 2018 with a B.S. in Biomedical Sciences. As an undergraduate, Arhem ran R.I.S.E., a nonprofit tutoring and mentoring program for refugee youth, and led her local Challah for Hunger chapter to address food insecurity in her community. She also conducted neuroscience research at the University of Arizona College of Medicine Phoenix. In her gap year, Arhem worked on a project to expand resources for resettled refugees in Arizona in conjunction with the Clinton Global Initiative University and was also a scribe at Stanford. As a MedEd scholar, Arhem is interested in exploring diversity in medical education and hopes to create more opportunities for medical students to learn about health disparities and cultural competency.

Maura Doré

Maura grew up just outside of Chicago in Naperville, IL and graduated from the University of
Notre Dame in 2017 with a B.S. in Neuroscience and minor in Poverty Studies. As an
undergraduate, Maura was a member of the Notre Dame Pom Squad, a volunteer Emergency
Medical Technician, calculus teaching assistant, and class council representative. Additionally,
she was a research assistant in the Architecture, Health, and Sustainability Research Lab
investigating the relationship between the built environment and health. After graduation,
Maura became a Teach For America Corps Member to pursue her interests in education and
social justice. She taught 5 th grade math and science in Chicago while earning a Master of Arts in
Teaching degree. While teaching, she focused on using data to drive instruction and prioritized
social-emotional learning to support the overall wellness of her students. Her experience in
teaching is the foundation for her interest in medical education. As a MedEd Scholar, Maura
hopes to apply her knowledge of the teaching cycle to improve medical education and to
explore the relationship of environment, health, and wellness in adult learners.

Elena Haight

Elena comes to Geisel from the San Francisco Bay Area. She spent the three years prior to beginning medical school studying pain mechanisms at Stanford, a topic she is passionate about given the prevalence of pain in our society and the difficulties we face in treating it effectively and safely. When she wasn’t playing with mice in the lab, she had many opportunities to cultivate an interest in medical education. In addition to teaching high school, undergraduate, and medical students about basic and clinical pain science, she led a study within the Department of Anesthesiology at Stanford to assess the effectiveness of a resident research track at increasing overall career scholarly productivity of anesthesiologists. As a MedEd Scholar, Elena is eager to continue this work through projects related to the implementation of the longitudinal pain and addiction section of the new curriculum.

Reed Macey

Reed is from Hooksett, NH. He graduated from Cornell University in 2018 with a B.A. in Biological Sciences, concentrating in Animal Physiology. As an undergraduate Reed spent much of his free time as a youth counselor for the YMCA, a mathematics and science tutor for inmates at the county jail, and a teacher’s assistant for several classes. In 2019 he achieved his Master’s Degree in Bioscience Enterprise at the University of Cambridge in England. During this time Reed played Varsity Ice Hockey, functioned as a consultant for faculty inventors, and conducted his dissertation in women’s digital health.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Reed hopes to create options for students to explore biotechnology and business inside medicine, as both have an increasing presence in the everyday practice of medicine. Interdisciplinary education has always been something he has believed strongly in, and he hopes that such relevant and exciting exploratory opportunities at Geisel will enhance education.

Emily May

Co-Leader 2020-2021

Emily May grew up between Cody, WY and Polson, MT. She graduated from the University of Montana in 2011 and followed a passion for education to the Bay Area. She spent four years teaching special education in the West Contra Costa and San Francisco Unified School Districts. Outside of school hours, she designed science and technology classes for a national summer camp, tutored SAT/ACT students, and learned as much as she could about curriculum design and instruction.

Teaching and working with families deepend Emily’s love of education and inspired a new interest in medicine. In a single, manically busy year, she took a general chemistry class while teaching full-time and made the decision to change careers. Throughout a post-baccalaureate program at San Francisco State, volunteering at Women’s Community Clinic and clinical research in UCSF’s Department of Anesthesia, she stayed engaged with education by tutoring and teaching whenever possible. Most recently, she channeled that passion into working with Dr. Terrence Welch to design formative assessments for the first year Cardiovascular Medicine Course and co-leading the Medical Education Scholar group. She believes teaching is central to medicine and hopes to stay engaged with education throughout her future career.

Linda Morris

Co-Leader 2020-2021

Linda grew up in Ridgewood, New Jersey, and graduated from Boston College in 2017 with a degree in Biology. During undergrad, Linda studied abroad at King's College School of Bioscience in London, pursued both clinical and lab bench oncology research, worked as a medical volunteer abroad and locally, and helped lead community service organizations in the surrounding Boston area. During this time, Linda worked as a tutor and mentor for Boston high school and elementary school students as well as fellow college students, through which she discovered a love of teaching and mentorship. Post-graduation, Linda worked for two years in clinical research in the Radiation Oncology department of the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center. Her interest in medical education grew, along with a developing interest in patient education in a clinical setting.

Linda's interests as a Medical Education Scholar are vast and varied, but she is particularly interested in the utilization of active learning methods to help foster effective and efficient individualized learning in Geisel's new curriculum. She is also interested in professional development, interdisciplinary education in healthcare, and patient advocacy through education.

Michaela O’Connor

Michaela grew up in Concord, NH and graduated from Columbia University with a BA in Neuroscience. At Columbia, Michaela was on the Women’s Varsity Lacrosse Team and was a Teaching Assistant in an introductory psychology course. Following college, Michaela worked in the Orthopedics Department at Columbia University where she focused on studying arthroscopic hip procedures within Sports Medicine. While at Columbia Orthopedics, Michaela was exposed to resident education through watching attendings and residents interact in the operating room. Through seeing these one-on-one teaching relationships, Michaela realized that she was interest in exploring different ways that she may be able to teach others in the future.

Michaela’s particular area of interest as a Medical Education Scholar is in providing a more thorough and nuanced education to medical students on how to care for patients with disabilities. Michaela has already had opportunities to begin this work along with two other Med Ed Scholars (Linda Morris and Arvind Suresh) as well as with classmate, Evette Ronner. Michaela hopes to continue to pursue avenues to ensure teaching on disability care persists throughout the curriculum at Geisel.

Andrew Pineda

Drew grew up in Los Angeles, CA and graduated from the University of California at Santa Barbara with a degree in Chemical Engineering. After college he worked in both the aerospace and automotive industries, designing parts for commercial and military aircraft and vehicles. Prior to starting school at Geisel, Drew called San Francisco his home for 7 years where he decided to transition from his career in engineering to pursuing a career in medicine. While working for the San Francisco Department of Public Health, he developed panel/population health management tools to help improve care and outcomes at a community clinic. He also volunteered as a health coach and quality improvement director at a student-run free clinic that provided care to San Francisco residents, particularly of Filipino descent. As a MedEd Scholar, Drew is interested in exploring ways to address the informal and hidden curriculum in medical education and training.

Arvind Suresh

Arvind grew up in Orange County, California and graduated from Dartmouth College
with a degree in Biology and minor in Computer Science in 2019. Throughout his time
as an undergraduate, he worked at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center as a student
researcher and examined holistic and integrative approaches to medicine as a Stamps
Scholar. Arvind’s experiences as a clinical intern at DotHouse Health, a federally
qualified community health center in Boston, sparked his interest in health education
and literacy as he developed patient education materials and a mobile guide to
community resources as part of the clinic’s outreach efforts. It was during this time that
Arvind developed a passion for teaching and coaching others as a pre-health mentor,
teaching assistant for introductory computer science and biology courses, and study
group leader through Dartmouth’s Academic Skills Center. Wanting to share his love of
lifelong learning, storytelling, and cross-disciplinary thinking, he initiated Dartmouth’s
annual TEDx conference in 2018, bringing together the Upper Valley community and
learners of all ages together in an effort to showcase how bold ideas can drive positive
change and innovation in the communities we belong to.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Arvind is working on improving the curriculum
regarding caring for underserved patient populations, incorporating more longitudinal
disability-focused education, and integrating foundational and applied sciences in the
preclinical curriculum. He is also interested in building longitudinal feedback tools for
self-directed learning and professional growth.

Kate Telma

Kate graduated from Brown University with a concentration in chemical biology. After working at a biotech start up, she pursued a Master’s in Science Writing at MIT. Her interests include using an abolitionist framework to structure medical student participation in the care of incarcerated people and inter- and intra- class student organizing efforts to affect school financial decisions.

Stephen Conn

Stephen grew up in Maryland and attended Pomona College, majoring in Linguistics and Cognitive Science. He worked for eleven years in the Bay Area in software development and product management. He has volunteered as an HIV Test Counselor and is completing a pilot project investigating peer counseling via web-based chat for PrEP awareness and benefits navigation. Stephen worked with UCSF's PleasePrEPMe program to evaluate and optimize their digital outreach, and advised the CA DPH Office of AIDS on statewide coordination of LGBTQ public health campaigns. He has worked extensively with children dealing with death. He has particular interest in primary care and palliative care, especially with children and in LGBTQ/HIV-impacted communities.

As a Med Ed Scholar, his interests are in sexual and LGBTQ health and equity in medicine, and in the future of standardized assessment.

Gwendolyn Cook

Gwen grew up in Portland, Oregon and graduated from Middlebury College with a degree in Architectural Studies and a minor in Italian in 2013. After college she moved to San Francisco, CA and worked at the UCSF Hematology and Blood and Marrow Transplant Clinic while completing a post-baccalaureate program at San Francisco State University. Gwen also volunteered during this time at the California Pacific Medical Center Emergency Department and developed an interest in the integration of social and other services into the ED setting. Following completion of her post-baccalaureate program Gwen worked full time as a Clinical Research Coordinator in the Hematopoietic Malignancies Research Group at UCSF.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Gwen has various interests including the use of technology in medical education, the integration of humanities-based approaches into medical school curriculum and the need for leadership training and mentoring for women entering the medical field.

Sethly Davis

Sethly grew up in Bolton, Massachusetts and Washington DC. She graduated from Johns Hopkins University in 2016 where she majored in English Literature. She continued her literary education in graduate school obtaining a Master's in Early Modern English Literature at the the University of Oxford. While at Oxford, Sethly wrote her dissertation on depictions of traumatic violence on the English stage in the 1590's, working to understand the relationships between physical trauma, psychological trauma, and concepts of identity and compassion.

Sethly's interest in medical education arose from her own cross-disciplinary background where she has seen how literature, and the medical humanities more expansively, can be used as a tool for understanding patients' experiences and needs. Thus, in her role as a MedEd scholar, she is particularly keen on working to further incorporate the humanities into medical curricula.

Deborah Furman

Deborah grew up in Providence, RI and graduated from Northeastern University in 2012 with a BS in Mechanical Engineering. Prior to pursuing a career in medicine, she spent several years working as an engineer in product design and robotics in the Boston area. After completing her post-baccalaureate coursework at Harvard Extension School, Deborah became a teaching fellow in General Chemistry at HES. It was during this time that she discovered not only her love for teaching, but its implicit mentorship as well. As a MedEd scholar, Deborah hopes to facilitate the transition to the new pre-clinical curriculum at Geisel and help to develop tools that will allow for its continuous improvement.

Chloe Lee

I grew up in Westchester, NY and graduated from Dartmouth College in 2014 with a degree in Classics and a Neuroscience minor. I worked in lung cancer research through the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology here at Geisel and involved with the Tucker Center as a Sibs mentor (my little is now 16 and we're still friends!). I also spent 5 months in China working as a preschool teacher in an orphanage for children with special needs, at which point, I realized my interest in public health and decided to pursue that interest actively. In 2018, I graduated from Columbia University with an MPH in Molecular Epidemiology. I spend most of my spare time baking, running, and yelling at untidy chefs on Kitchen Nightmares.

As a Med Ed scholar, my interests are very diverse and include encouraging an awareness of the value of the humanities in medicine, improving pre-clinical design and resources, and emphasizing the intersection between health and the environment.

Colin McLeish

Colin is originally from Manchester, Vermont. He graduated from Swarthmore College in 2018 with a B.A. in Biology and English Literature. As an undergraduate, Colin volunteered as a hospice caretaker and conducted research in microbiology and biomedical engineering. He also wrote for the Swarthmore Literary Review and served for two years as an academic liaison to the Department of English Literature. As a MedEd Scholar, Colin intends to develop more formal programming for humanities in medical education. In specific, he hopes to add more opportunities for medical students to read and write, and plans to advocate for more student research and scholarly work in the fields of medical humanities and medical history.

Joe Minichiello

Leader 2019-2020

Joe grew up in the small town of Pelham in southern NH. He graduated from Dartmouth College with majors in Biology and Psychology. During his undergraduate experience at Dartmouth, he completed an honors thesis, served as a teaching assistant in genetics and organic chemistry, and volunteered with Dartmouth EMS. After graduating, he completed a Teaching Science Fellowship in the Department of Biological Sciences at Dartmouth. As a MedEd Scholar, Joe is particularly interested in curriculum design, teaching pedagogy, and the integration of technology into medical education.

Sohum Patel

Sohum is from San Jose, CA and graduated from Georgetown University with a degree in Economics and a minor in Mathematics. At Georgetown, he worked as a volunteer EMT and pursued research in development economics and health economics. His interest in medical education stems from his work as an EMT instructor as well as a teaching assistant and tutor for Multivariable Calculus. As a student, he developed an interest in the intersection of social science and math for healthcare applications. Therefore, for his gap year, he explored the efficacy of Norway's two-tiered emergency healthcare system as a Fulbright scholar at the University of Oslo. Specifically, he was interested in the effects of a "gatekeeper" model on physician referral behaviors and patient outcomes. As a MedEd scholar, Sohum hopes to continue exploring the intersection of social and quantitative sciences and its place in medical education and clinical practice.

Abiah Pritchard

Abiah grew up in Charlottesville, VA and attended Dartmouth College. She graduated in 2017 with a degree in Biochemistry and a minor in Anthropology of Global Health. As an undergrad, she was part of the club triathlon team, a volunteer at David's House and the Center for Perinatal Advocacy, and did research in oncology at Norris Cotton Cancer Center. During a gap year, she worked in pharmaceutical research and consulting, and became particularly interested in the cost impacts of healthcare for individual patients and broader societies.

As a MedEd scholar, she hopes to improve resources available in years 1 and 2 for clinical education and developing forums for learning about residency match earlier in medical school. In the future, Abiah hopes to pursue a career in academic medicine and be a lifelong learner and teacher.

Landis Walsh

Landis grew up in Winchester, Massachusetts and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2017 with a degree in Biology. While at Penn, he competed on the Lightweight Rowing team, volunteered at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and developed a mentorship program between the rowing team and the Friends of Jaclyn Foundation, combining his passion of rowing and working with children. He then spent a fifth year in Philadelphia working as a research technician in the Pharmacology department at Penn.

As a MedEd Scholar, Landis is intent on developing a mentorship program primarily for first and second year students. Specifically, he aims to get first and second year students, who are unsure about what field of medicine they might pursue, into the hospital more often so they have more opportunities to develop their passions outside of the classroom.

Sarah Bessen

Sarah grew up in Las Vegas, Nevada. She graduated from Dartmouth College in 2016 with a degree in Anthropology and a minor in Chinese. At Dartmouth, Sarah played on the Women's Tennis Team, and worked as a peer tutor in Organic Chemistry, Animal Physiology, and Chinese. After college, Sarah completed a Master's in Public Health at the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice (TDI). At TDI, Sarah developed a STEM and Healthcare exposure program, aimed at increasing exposure to diverse careers in STEM and Healthcare, which was implemented across a few different schools in the Upper Valley. Her interests as a MedEd scholar range from incorporating the humanities into medical education, as well as understanding the way undergraduate and graduate medical education impact the supply and distribution of physicians across different specialties and geographies.

Natalie Del Favero

Natalie grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. Before long, she found herself in Los Angeles studying Neuroscience and Human Evolutionary Biology at the University of Southern California. When not soaking up the sun, she worked with a federally funded program to promote reading comprehension and literacy in low-income preschools. After graduation, Natalie combined her love of the sciences with her desire to reach young malleable minds in the form of a children's book series. The Quaint and Quizzical Cosmos was self-published on Amazon 2014 and has since been a bedtime story for thousands of children worldwide.

Natalie intends to keep her flame for curiosity and teaching lit throughout her medical training and future career. She is interested in Evolutionary Medicine (harkening back to her college years) to provide deeper clinical context and visualization tools to facilitate comprehension.

In her free time Natalie enjoys spending time with her husband, reading about physics, watching basketball, and meditating.

Sylvia Guerra

Sylvia Guerra is originally from Texas and went to college at the University of Rochester where she majored in religion. She continued her studies at Harvard Divinity School where she earned a Master of Theological Studies in comparative religion, focusing on comparative mythology and critical theory. Shortly afterwards, she began her post-baccalaureate work at the Harvard Extension School, where she later worked as a Teaching Fellow for Organic Chemistry. Sylvia worked as a scribe for over four years, and was eventually responsible for scribe training, and developed new ways to help scribes learn complex medical material. Before coming to Geisel, Sylvia worked at the Cambridge Health Alliance as an HIV/HCV, STI, and substance use prevention community health worker where she engaged in curriculum design and delivery for youth, as well as in HIV testing/counseling, education, and prevention.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Sylvia has a variety of interests all related to the intersection between social justice and medicine. She is interested in creating more training opportunities for cultural competency/humility training for medical students, she would like to help expand health disparities content in medical school curricula, and is also interested in the intersection of spirituality and medicine. She loves teaching and hopes to find a way to integrate her diverse interests into a career in academic medicine.

Tae Wuk Ko

Tae was born in Incheon, South Korea and grew up in Auckland, New Zealand. He graduated from UCLA with a degree in Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology and spent the past few years working in Health Information Management and volunteering at hospitals and free clinics. He first developed a passion for education while tutoring high school students from low-income and first-generation college backgrounds through the Upward Bound Program, where he helped to implement a Supplemental Instruction curriculum for peer-assisted study.

As a MedEd Scholar, Tae is interested in exploring ways to increase exposure to compassionate and holistic patient care in medical education and further developing opportunities for students to engage in peer-assisted learning. In the future, Taehopes to become involved in clinical education and contribute to sustainable global health.

Alex Lindqwister

Alex grew up in Peoria, IL and graduated from Stanford University with a bachelor's degree in Biomedical Computation and a Master's degree in Biology. While he initially focused on genomics and virology, he later became interested in social network analysis of forest-edge communities and computational epidemiology of spillover events. His interests in medical education stemmed from his experience as a teaching assistant for basic science courses, where he later became involved in curriculum restructuring and integrating non traditional teaching methods into introductory courses. During his graduate career, Alex designed, wrote, and taught his own introductory course entitled "Computational Frontiers in Biology" to encourage those without strong mathematics and computer science backgrounds to consider this exciting new area of research.

His interests as a MedEd scholar are on increasing on-ramping resources available to medical students with non-STEM backgrounds and modernizing the pre-clinical curriculum.

Kevin Stanko

Kevin grew up in Simsbury, Connecticut and graduated from Dartmouth College in 2016 with a degree in Biology. He then spent a year in Hanover working as a Teaching Science Fellow at Dartmouth. In this role, he served as a near-peer resource to students in introductory biology classes. He provided one-on-one teaching of class material and evidence-based study strategies, facilitated review sessions, and used student feedback to help professors improve current and future course offerings. Through this experience he became interested in the ways in which students learn, and how classes can be designed around this to help students learn more effectively.

As a MedEd Scholar, Kevin hopes to get involved in curriculum design. He is very interested in how pedagogical techniques of medical education are evolving at Geisel to incorporate more team-based learning and flipped classroom opportunities. He hopes to be involved in this change moving forward, as well as pursue the development of medical student-specific learning tools to facilitate transition into the high volume of material during the first year.

Kinan Bachour

Kinan is from a small town in Syria called Safita. He was born in Saudi Arabia and has lived in Kuwait, Syria, and Lebanon. Syria is a place very dear to his heart and he has never spent a summer away from it (if you want to know more about what is going on in the Middle East, come see him!). He graduated from UCLA in the spring of 2016 with a degree in Molecular, Cell and Developmental Biology. While at UCLA, he was involved in tutoring and mentoring programs, and worked with faculty to implement flipped core science classes in an effort to shift to more active learning. He also completed research on flipped classrooms and on methods to bridge the education gap between minorities, first generation college students and their classmates.

As an international student, and one of the youngest in his class, Kinan recognizes the difficulty in bridging and personalizing medical education for students of different ages, backgrounds, and experiences. As a Medical Education Scholar, he is interested in developing resources that will create an environment at Geisel that fosters opportunities for learning in non-traditional ways. He hopes to become involved in curriculum development.

John Damianos

John Damianos grew up on the seacoast of New Hampshire. He graduated from Dartmouth College in 2016 with a degree in linguistics modified with neuroscience and a minor in French. He studied abroad in France, TA'd courses in linguistics, French, and Modern Greek, and conducted original research in computational neurolinguistics. Outside of class, he dedicated himself to student health and wellness, serving as a Drug and Alcohol Peer Advisor, Undergraduate Advisor, and C. Everett Kooop Scholar in Addiction Studies. Focusing on improving campus climate around alcohol and other drugs, sexual violence, and sleep, John advocated for the use of Motivational Interviewing and personalized feedback sessions. He currently is a provider of the Brief Alcohol Screening Initiative for College Students (BASICS) for undergraduates.

As a MedEd Scholar, John is intent on continuing his work with Motivational Interviewing. Specifically, he aims to improve the teaching of MI among Geisel students and provide more opportunities to practice. He hopes to see every graduating Geisel student facile in MI, able to empower patients to make positive changes in their lives.

Bianca Di Cocco

Bianca grew up in New Windsor, NY and graduated from Cornell University with a degree in Biological Science in 2014. She then spent two years in New York City where she worked as a clinical research coordinator on over 20 lupus clinical trials. In addition to research, she used that time in New York to explore some musical theatre opportunities and work on a few creative writing projects. Her interests as a MedEd scholar are on finding new ways to synthesis material to make the learning process less stressful. She is also interested in using different techniques from the arts in order to enrich the medical learning experience.

Reza Hessabi

I grew up around Los Angeles, CA and completed a Bachelor's in Neuroscience, with a minor in Middle East and North African Studies, at UCLA in 2012. While there I first discovered a passion for education while serving as a mentor/workshop leader to Muslim and Afghan Youth in the wider Los Angeles area. I also found fantastic science mentors at the labs of Dr. Ann Hirsch and Dr. Alcino Silva, whose values instilled in me a desire to always be curious and skeptical. After graduating I worked in politics before moving on to New Orleans where I completed a Special Master's Program at Tulane University. Along with my studies there, I taught at a Diabetes education class with Daughters of Charity. After graduating in 2014, I moved back to LA and spent the next two years continuing to pursue my passion for education by teaching with Kaplan. In my free time I help moderate an online, novel writing/critique group consisting of 230+ authors. I also help run The Samovar Network, a monthly online discussion panel of Afghan-Americans from across the world discussing issues relevant to our diaspora.

As a MedEd Scholar I hope to improve the ability of medical students to integrate into the communities that surround them by incorporating more immersive experiences into the curriculum. Discovering the right questions, and the right people, to ask in order to best facilitate a deeper understanding of patient populations is something I wish to make a standard at Geisel.

Lauren Kascak

Lauren is from Trumbull, Connecticut. She studied Neurobiology and English as an undergraduate at University of Connecticut. Fascinated by the intersection between literature and medicine, and the power of illness narratives in both the clinical encounter and society at large, Lauren has completed the Master's Program in Narrative Medicine at Columbia University and spent the past couple of years leading creative writing workshops for patients and clinicians. As a certified yoga instructor, she is passionate about self-care, preventive medicine, and evidence-based holistic healing modalities. Lauren recently graduated from Georgetown University with an MS in Physiology and Biophysics with a specialization in Complementary and Alternative Medicine. As a medical student, she is exploring ways to foster self-care and resiliency in medical education, as well as to elevate and sustain the culture of compassion at Geisel and Dartmouth-Hitchcock.

Cassie Kosarek

Cassie grew up in northern New Jersey and graduated from Bryn Mawr College in 2012 with a major in English and a minor in psychology. While at Bryn Mawr, she worked as an undergraduate writing tutor, helping students navigate everything from their first essays as freshman to research proposals, theses, and scholarship applications. After finishing an undergraduate thesis that examined a memoir of mental illness in the context of narrative medicine, Cassie went on to work as a member of the editorial staff at the Annals of Thoracic Surgery. While at the Annals, she became interested both in how physicians' writing influences clinical medicine and in the field of medicine itself. She completed her premedical prerequisites at the Bryn Mawr Postbaccalaureate Premedical Program in May of 2015 and worked as an emergency department scribe and content writer for several news outlets in the intervening year prior to her medical school matriculation at Geisel.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Cassie is interested in exploring the role of reading and writing in physician's professional lives and in improving medical students' readiness to contribute both to clinical and research medical literature.

Devanshi Mehta

Devanshi is from Warren, New Jersey and spent the undergraduate portion of her career at the University of Pennsylvania. During this time she chose to major in the Biological Basis of Behavior. She was also heavily involved in mental health education, pediatric genetics research, and visual art. At Penn, a passion for mental health advocacy coupled with a need for wellness in the student body inspired her to lead Active Minds, a mental health organization. As president, she led efforts to transform the atmosphere on campus by increasing students' awareness of mental health issues, serving as a liaison between students and the University staff employees, and public speaking about the importance of self-care, combatting perfectionism, and accepting rejection. She was happy to share what her team had accomplished when approached by The New York Times, ESPN, Huffington Post, and Psychology Today, which she hopes produces ideas for other schools to implement. She also pursued her passions in advocating for overlooked populations through genetics research and clinical volunteering at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. For the past 3 years, she led studies investigating gene expression, food diets, hearing loss, limb development, and neuronal mechanisms in rare genetic diagnoses, with a primary focus on Cornelia de Lange Syndrome (CdLS) and CHOPS syndrome. She was grateful to teach her findings to the patients, families, and clinicians at the national CdLS conferences in Costa Mesa, California and Orlando, Florida.

As a MedEd scholar she is excited to increase compassionate care in medical education, increase patient and physician exposure in preclinical years, and help optimize a holistic education for Geisel students. In the future she hopes to work at a teaching hospital where she can continue to practice, be involved with research, and teach.

Jaleesa Akuko

Jaleesa Akuoko was born in Chicago IL, and grew up in Southeastern Wisconsin. She graduated from the University of Chicago in 2012 with a degree in Biological Sciences, and studies in French Literature. As an undergraduate, Jaleesa conducted research in the Center for Health and Social Sciences, as well as in the Department of Behavioral Neuroscience and Psychiatry. She was a four-year varsity member of the University of Chicago Track and Field team, and served as team captain in her senior year. In 2015, Jaleesa received her MSc in Biology from NYU with a focus on neuroscience. As both an undergraduate and graduate student, she led several undergraduate courses, and became fascinated by the various ways in which one can answer the question "why?"

As a Geisel student and MedEd scholar, she is excited to explore the growth of diversity and cultural competency training in medical education, the role of narrative medicine and otherness in patient-physician encounters, and strategies to optimize small-group facilitation in medical education.

In the future, Jaleesa hopes to work as an academic physician in a teaching hospital, where she can pursue research and teach in conjunction with her clinical responsibilities.

Annie Cravero

I grew up in a little town called Hanover, NH and completed my undergrad at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine. While at Bates I double majored in French and Biochemistry, and led a club focused on environmental activism and climate change education. After graduating from Bates in 2013, I worked several temporary jobs including a summer on the field crew at Cedar Circle Farm in East Thetford, VT. In January of 2014, I started working at Dartmouth Health Connect, a primary care clinic in Hanover. I served many different roles at the clinic and was eventually promoted to a health coaching position, a role that helped me develop skills in motivational interviewing and behavior change coaching. As a medical student, I have become interested in how medical schools are teaching motivational interviewing and preparing future doctors to not only to treat disease, but also support patients in making positive life changes that will help them stay healthy. As a Medical Education scholar I plan to work with the faculty on how to improve this aspect of the Geisel curriculum, and to organize workshops for my fellow students on how to become a motivational interviewing master!

Tsuzumi Kanaoka

Tsuzumi was born and raised in rural Tottori, Japan. As an immigrant with cultural and language barriers, navigating through the American educational system was a challenge. Fortunately, she met many supportive mentors who helped her get to where she is now. Inspired by her mentors' unconditional generosity and extraordinary teaching skills, she initiated an independent study project as an undergraduate, studying how evidence-based teaching methods could effectively help adults learn sciences. Tsuzumi's deep appreciation for her own mentors, especially to the Emergency Medicine physician who worked with her, drives her commitment to medical education.

As a MedEd Scholar, she works with The Dartmouth Institute (TDI) Preference Laboratory to develop Shared Decision Making training programs for interdisciplinary health providers. She is the 2016 student representative for the Geisel Academy of Master Educators (GAME) as well as in leading the MedEd applicant selection process.

Thomas Kuczmarski

I was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois and graduated from Williams College in 2012. At Williams, I was a Chinese and Psychology major and a member of the cross country and track & field teams. After college, I lived in Taiwan for one year and taught English at two elementary schools and a psychiatric hospital on a Fulbright grant. From 2013 to 2015, I worked as a clinical research coordinator in the Emergency Department at Brigham and Women's Hospital. In my free time, I enjoy running, playing basketball, backpacking, and watching Chicago sports teams. I am particularly interested in optimizing study methods for medical students. In specific, I hope to demonstrate the importance of spaced learning, rather than massed learning (i.e. cramming), and to create more opportunities for students to engage in spaced learning.

David Leander

David was born in Daegu, South Korea, and was raised in St. Louis, Mo. He attended Northwestern University, and graduated in 2010 as a triple major in Materials Science, Economics, and Spanish with a minor in Global Health Studies. David was involved in athletics as a dedicated member of the varsity cheerleading team, serving as captain in his final years. He studied abroad in Mexico City through a public health summer program, assisting in data collection for metabolic syndrome research by interviewing subjects in Spanish. David pursued two other significant undergraduate research projects in biomaterials and public health.

After graduation, David worked for three years as a Project Manager at Epic Systems, a leading electronic medical records company based in Madison, Wis. During his first year of work, he continued his passion for performance through cheerleading and stunting with the professional basketball team, the Milwaukee Bucks. Through his work at Epic, David led implementations of software systems in emergency departments, and traveled to over 80 hospitals across the country. After pursuing a post-bacc and taking the MCAT, David continued to work with Epic software as a consultant while interviewing for medical schools.

His interest in Med Ed Scholars is based in the technology involved in medical education, specifically electronic medical records. He hopes to integrate learning about how to use this necessary documentation system as first and second year medical students head to On Doc and prepare for 3rd year rotations. He feels that an attitude towards embracing technology starts in medical school!

Sandy Rao

Sandy graduated as a neuroscience major from Hamilton College. She loves teaching and has a special place in her heart for corny science puns (come find her if you have any). While at Hamilton she tutored fifth graders in math, wrote and delivered a nutrition curriculum for tenth graders, and competed in many public speaking competitions. At Geisel, she hopes to focus on improving communication in medicine through public speaking and oral presentation workshops. In her free time, which is sparse as a medical student, she enjoys expressing her inner artist by volunteering at the AVA gallery with "Art for Kids" and going tandem kayaking. If she had to describe herself with one word, it would be enthusiasm.

Sean Sun

Hello. I am a first year medical student from Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. My current project involves creating an online program that integrates all student-created study materials from past years into a single database. If all goes according to plan, first and second years will have access to many years of organized study materials by the end of this academic year.

I graduated from UC Berkeley in Spring 2015. In undergrad, I was an avid tutor, study group leader and committee member for education. When I have free time, I like to ski, paint, play piano/guitar/tennis, run, eat, and travel.

Philip Montana

Philip Montana has been an educator for almost 15 years. He has taught elementary, middle and high school as well as college and post-bacc students. Additionally, he has worked as substitute faculty at Connecticut College and Boston Conservatory. Most recently, he worked as the Head Laboratory Teaching Fellow at both Harvard College, Extension School and Summer School where spent time redesigning the labs to shift the focus from simple data collection to a stronger emphasis on real conceptual understanding. He is currently a teacher at the Lebanon Ballet School. He also serves on the Medical Education Committee as one of the Class Curriculum representatives and works as member of Geisel's admissions committee.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Philip established the Peer Tutoring program at Geisel and oversees this program in 2015-2016.

Rebecca Masutani

Rebecca Masutani was born and raised in Hawai'i. Prior to entering the Class of 2018 at the Geisel School of Medicine, Rebecca worked as a Senior Education Associate at the Medicare Rights Center, where she counseled Medicare beneficiaries on Medicare rights and benefits, delivered Medicare presentations to the community, wrote periodicals on health care topics, and developed an online Medicare learning program for health care professionals. In her spare time, Rebecca acts as a medical school liaison for the Upper Valley Memory Café and also leads the Geriatrics Interest Group at the Geisel School of Medicine.

Rebecca is the president of the Medical Education Scholars for the 2015-2016 academic term. As a Medical Education Scholar, she has organized events related to medical education and has worked on program logistics and planning.

Mike Connerney

Mike Connerney grew up in Scarborough, Maine, and La Paz, Bolivia. His research experience at Boston University gave him exposure to excellent mentors, and since then he has aspired to guide and teach his future students with the same level of understanding. At Boston University, Mike double majored in Psychology and Biology with a specialization in Neurobiology, graduating with a minor in Music. After finishing his undergraduate studies, he completed an M.S. in Medical Sciences at Boston University School of Medicine in 2014. During his master's program, Mike tutored several medical courses and was a TA for Medical Histology. Currently at Geisel, Mike is tutoring CTO and assisting with the CTO laboratory component. Outside of class, Mike serves as a teacher for Medical Spanish, is a co-leader for Migrant Health, and coordinates the Spanish conversation tables group Café Español. He enjoys cooking, playing piano, and taking advantage of the great outdoors.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Mike has organized events related to medical education, with topics pertaining to motivational interviewing and transitioning to clerkship years. Mike also helped develop the Medical Education Scholars website in 2015.

Erin D'Agostino

Erin D'Agostino went to Bowdoin College and completed majors in Neuroscience and Visual Arts. Erin knew that she wanted to pursue medicine, but that before medical school, wanted to apply the awesome things she had learned in her Neuroscience major concretely. For that reason, Erin became a high school teacher. Specifically, she became a special educator: Erin taught high school students with language based learning disabilities. During that time she also worked on a masters in special education, did clinical research in developmental pediatrics, and volunteered at a Russian neuropsychological orphanage. These experiences fueled her desire to work both as an educator and as a doctor. Her particular interests lie in motivation, metacognition, and adverse childhood experiences, and what role they play in learning and development.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Erin has researched learning motivations and strategies of medical students. She also helped develop the MedEd Scholars peer mentoring program, acting as the Geisel Academy of Master Educators (GAME) representative in 2015-2016.

Raphi Gold

Raphi Gold is a member of the Geisel School of Medicine Class of 2018, originally from Long Island, NY. She graduated from Harvard College in 2013, where she studied neurobiology, and received a master's degree in public health from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in 2014. Raphi is interested in the experience of medical students, both with the curriculum and beyond it, including study strategies and personal resources. She also hopes to explore the way population health, epidemiology and preventative medicine are taught to medical students. Beyond the four years of medical school, she hopes to incorporate teaching into her future career.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Raphi helped oversee the MedEd interview and selection process in 2015.

Jenny Zheng

Jenny Zheng is from Toronto, Canada. She completed a teaching degree from the University of Toronto and taught high school chemistry and science for a year prior to entering Geisel. Teaching and has always played a big role in her upbringing - with several educators in her family, Jenny is constantly reminded of how the artful delivery of knowledge can influence the life of another. Jenny is interested in curriculum design and improving medical students' experiences as we transition from the classroom, to clerkship, to residency and beyond, with an emphasis on addressing mental health concerns.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Jenny has organized events on topics related to medical education, such as transitions to clerkship years. She also helped develop the Medical Education Scholars website in 2015.

Peter Kahng

Peter Kahng grew up in a town called Northport on Long Island. He attended Amherst College where he majored in biology. Following his graduation in May, 2013, Peter moved to Boston to serve a year as an AmeriCorps member with the American Red Cross of Massachusetts in the Disaster Services department. Additionally, he taught ExamKrackers MCAT courses throughout the year and privately tutored for the MCAT through Cambridge Coaching Company. Since then, teaching and medical education have steadily moved closer to the forefront of Peter's mind with an ultimate goal of being a physician in academic medicine.

As a Medical Education Scholar, Peter helped oversee the MedEd interview and selection process in 2015.

Auriel T. August

Auriel first became interested in education and teaching after falling in love with her AP World History teacher in high school. "As a science nerd, anyone who could make me care about history must be a magician!" As an undergraduate at Duke University she helped organize outreach programs to local primary schools hoping to foster interest in math and science in minority youth. After matriculating to Geisel, Auriel became Dartmouth's OSR representative to the AAMC helping to foster effective changes in medical education both at Dartmouth and in medical schools across the nation. In addition to her work with the MedEds and peer tutoring she served as a member of the medical school Admissions Committee, Physicians for Human Rights, and Medical Students for Choice. In the future, Auriel plans to stay in academic medicine in whichever field she chooses in the hopes of teaching the next generation of physicians.

Rachel R. Blitzer

I love to learn (some would say I'm curious to a fault) and I have always been interested in the process of education itself. As we delve further in to schooling, much of that learning falls on our own shoulders; we have an imperative to gain knowledge and experience even if the material is presented in a less-digestible way. I'm interested in how the student can get the most out of a given learning experience, whether that is through new study techniques, different schemas/lenses, or many other techniques. As a Med Ed Scholar, I was able to help re-work part of the On Doctoring training material; it was heartening to give back to Geisel and help to shape the curriculum from which I have gleaned so much. I am also fascinated by the ways that teaching helps us learn, and one of my goals is to strengthen the current Connect 4 program in the coming year.

Tiffany L. Brazile

A former dancer and personal trainer, Tiffany Brazile performed and taught throughout the U.S. and abroad, pioneering cultural exchange and educational outreach programs. While earning a second bachelor's degree Ms. Brazile worked as a Supplemental Instruction Facilitator in Biology and as a private STEM tutor in New Jersey. She now serves as a mentor for 1000 Girls, 1000 Futures through the New York Academy of Sciences' Global STEM Alliance. Her current research focuses on improving project-based educational opportunities for both medical and engineering students so that they can develop the skills required to effectively collaborate and innovate.

Jonathan Burgess

Jonathan Burgess is a published natural foods chef, former owner of Alive Natural Foods Catering Company and Johann the Conqueror's Vegan Baking Company. After graduating summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania, he completed research internships at Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health researching the effects of diet and lifestyle interventions on healthcare professionals and patient populations. He was formerly the Manager of the Wellness Program at Ipswitch, Inc, a 300-person information technology company in Lexington, Massachusetts. His interests in medicine are to explore the frontier of preventive and proactive medicine in an effort to foster cultural change towards a healthier nation.

Samantha A. Connell

I am originally from Peterborough, New Hampshire. I attended Johns Hopkins University for college and received a degree in biology and philosophy. I then went on to complete Teach for America in inner city Baltimore where I taught middle school math and science. I will be matching in pediatrics this spring and plan to pursue a career in academic medicine with focus on medical education.

Aaron J. Steen

The doctor's role of educator is easily overlooked compared to the roles of healer and scientist. I worked with Dr. Ann Davis, our former Dean of Student Affairs, to establish an extracurricular student group to promote conversation and skills development for a select group of interested students. I'm proud of how the group has grown to become a major contributor to curricular and learning environment improvements at the Geisel School of Medicine. In addition to the Med Ed events, I have written/edited an interactive anatomy and embryology iPad text, developed a clinical teaching elective, and collaborated on a variety of faculty projects.

I'm a fourth year student (Class of 2016) applying in dermatology. My fiance and I live in White River Junction with our two wonderful dogs...and three wonderful roommates. I'm an avid and lifelong soccer fan, I love to garden, and I look forward to being to able to travel again some day.

John J. Hon

John Hon is a rising third year currently on an academic scholar year. His experiences in teaching range from tutoring and mentoring middle school students in New Orleans to teaching English in rural Korea.

Obinna G. Ofoche

My name is Obi Ofoche and I am a current Third Year Medical Student at Geisel. I hail from the city of Baltimore, MD and am graduate of the University of Maryland College Park. After a year of Post-Bac at Drexel, I decided to take a year off from pre-medical education and join AmeriCorps as a volunteer teacher at charter high school situated in North Philadelphia geared toward the lower income residents of the city. My aspiration toward incorporating teaching into future career was born here and wherever my medical education takes me, I would need the instruction of future physicians to be integral to my practice. This was the reason for my joining of the Medical Education Scholars; to be a part of community of students that is committed to the same goal of instruction and teaching excellence that is vital for the future of medicine.

Charis Ripley-Hager

I am originally from Atlanta, Georgia and completed four years in the Army before finishing my undergraduate degree in Biology at Georgia State University. I have held a strong interest in education throughout my training. As an undergraduate student, I worked as a teaching assistant for a pre-nursing Human Anatomy and Physiology lab during which I had the opportunity to create my own classes for the lab. As a member of MEd Scholars, I created one of our teach the teacher classes about writing objectives. I am currently working with 2 other students to develop a fourth year elective for the MEd Scholars and other students interested in medical education. I am applying into General Surgery and hope to continue working as educator throughout my career.

Marietta E. Smith

Hailing from the suburbs of Chicago, Marietta Smith is a member of the Geisel Class of 2017. As a Med Ed Scholar, she is interesting in exploring the history of medical education, nutrition and culinary medicine, and leadership development. In 2014-2015, she and Katie S. ran a focus group about nutrition education in medical school, and she and Dave W. coordinated a lunch event about careers in academic medicine that featured a discussion with two Geisel faculty members. She also serves as a Curriculum Representative for Geisel Student Government and the Medical Education Committee.

Kathryn M. Stephsenson

A California native, Katie came to Geisel with a background in public health and clinical research. She joined the Med Ed scholars in 2014 with an interest in cooking, nutrition and how to best develop these skills in medical students. She looks forward to a career in academic medicine.