Graduate Fellows
Doctoral Student, Narrative Medicine, Columbia University
Katie Neimeyer is a graduate student in the Narrative Medicine program at Columbia University, where she also works as a research coordinator in the Taub Institute and Sergievsky Center on several neurogenetic studies. As an intern in the Summer Internship for Indigenous Peoples in Genomics Canada (SING Canada) 2019 program at the University of Alberta, she participated in a dialogue about Indigenous bioethics and approaches to genomic sciences. She plans on pursuing a career in genetic counseling after she completes her M.S. in Narrative Medicine.
Doctoral Student, Social Personality Psychology, CUNY
Akemi Nishida is a doctoral student in the social personality psychology PhD program and an adjunct lecturer in Psychology and Disability Studies at City University of New York. Using frameworks of social justice studies and critical disability studies, her work focuses on the politicization of disabled people and community building in relation to intersecting oppression and privilege. She is also a performer in a project ‘GIMP’ by Heidi Latsky Dance and a starting member of DISLABELEDtv, a media organization by disabled youth/young adults.
Doctoral Student, Biomedical Science, Columbia University
Christie Oliver will be starting at Columbia University, School of Professional Studies, as a graduate student in the Bioethics program in Fall 2017. She is from Edinburgh, Scotland and has a Bachelor’s degree with honors in Biomedical Science (Anatomy) from University of Aberdeen. Her thesis focused on fetal testosterone and the role it plays in the development of autism spectrum disorders. She is fascinated by the differences in health care systems globally and is passionate about the development of emerging medical fields. She is an active runner and loves to do yoga.
Curator, Oral History and Art, Elgiz Museum of Contemporary Art Istanbul
Işın Önol is a curator and writer based in New York. She has been working as an independent curator (predominantly in the USA, Austria and Turkey) since 2009. Before that, she led the Elgiz Museum of Contemporary Art Istanbul as its director and curator. (2006-2009). Her curatorial research focuses on interconnecting archival information with oral histories to create platforms for collective memory through collaborative art practices
PhD Student, American Studies, Yale University
Ittai is a Ph.D. candidate in American Studies. His dissertation is an intellectual history of intelligence and intellectual ability in 18th- and 19th-century America with a focus on popular literary texts. His other areas of expertise include the history of race, sexuality and gender studies, disability studies, and the history of capitalism. He has been a tutor for the undergraduate non-fiction writing course “Daily Themes,” a writing instructor, and an LSAT-prep tutor and instructor. His work has been published in American Quarterly and Public Books, and he has presented at the Modern and Contemporary Studies Initiative, American Studies Association and the Modern Language Association.
Doctoral Student, General Studies, Columbia University
Jeremy Orloff is a premed postbac student in the School of General Studies. Prior to his interest in medicine, he studied political science and history at Johns Hopkins University. He later worked in local New York City government relations. As a postbac, Jeremy has been involved in clinical research around obesity and related diseases.
Doctoral Student, International Finance and Economic Policy, Columbia University
Giovanni Pagán Vélez is a student from San Juan, Puerto Rico. He is an MPA candidate at Columbia SIPA, concentrating in International Finance and Economic Policy.
Doctoral Student, Medicine, Columbia University
Ming Pei is currently a pre-health student in the Pre-Medical Post Baccalaureate Program at Columbia University. Previously, she attended University of California, Berkeley earning a B.A. in Statistics and B.A. in Economics. She is interested in public health research and aims to make an impact on healthcare policy making.
Doctoral Student, Biomedical Informatics, Columbia University
Adrienne Pichon is a Research Coordinator under Dr. Noemie Elhadad in Columbia University’s Department of Biomedical Informatics. Her research interests center around leveraging emerging health technologies coupled with user-centered design to improve access to health-related information, access to care, and meaningful and actionable personal insights, particularly for vulnerable and marginalized populations.
Hannah Pivo is a Ph.D. candidate specializing in 19th- and 20th-century design and architecture, with a focus on the history of graphic design and information visualization. Her work has appeared in the journals Design Issues and Public Art Dialogue and she has contributed to exhibition catalogs on various topics in modern and contemporary art and design.
PhD Student, Sociomedical Sciences, Columbia University
Ronna A. Popkin is a Ph.D. Candidate in Sociomedical Sciences (SMS) with a concentration in Sociology at Columbia University. She was a Fellow in SMS's NICHD predoctoral training program in Gender, Sexuality, and Health. Her multi-disciplinary research interests span the fields of sociology, public health, science and technology studies, and gender studies, and include adolescent and young adult sexual and reproductive health, genetic risk, and women’s health in the United States. Prior to attending Columbia, Ms. Popkin worked as a community sexuality educator for Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin and lectured courses at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on sexuality education, women’s health, and the politics of fertility control. Ms. Popkin earned her M.S. in Health Education and B.S. with Honors in Women’s Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Doctoral Student, Public Health, Columbia University
Kenia has a clinical background and is an MHA '22 graduate of the Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University.
Ph.D. Candidate, Sociology, Columbia University
Hannah Pullen-Blasnik is a Ph.D. student and Paul F. Lazarsfeld Fellow in the Department of Sociology at Columbia University. She is also a Graduate Research Fellow at the Columbia Justice Lab on the Pennsylvania Solitary Study and the Rikers Island Longitudinal Study. Her primary research interests include social movements, political economy, and algorithms and technology.
Doctoral Student, Precision Medicine, State University of Bangladesh
Sikder Nahidul Islam Rabbi completed his Bachelor and Master’s in clinical pharmacy and pharmacogenetics from State University of Bangladesh. In the arena of research, he has worked with clinical pharmacokinetics, drug protein binding study, pharmacogenetics, SNP genotyping, HLA research and cancer genetics, better understanding about drug activation and pharmacodynamics variation based on patient’s genetics. His research interest includes, epigenetics, proto-oncogene mutation, cancer genetics and neuroscience.
Doctoral Student, Public Health, Columbia University
Syed Raza is a master of public health candidate in the department of Sociomedical Sciences at Columbia University where he is also completing a certificate in the Social Determinants of Health. His work focuses on the political economy, sociocultural aspects, and research methodologies of public health. His research interests include historical sociology, geopolitics, science and technology studies, social epidemiology, world-ecology analysis, and critical animal studies.
PhD Student, Systems Biology, Columbia University
Andrew Ressler is a PhD Candidate in the department of Systems Biology. Andrew is currently a researcher in the Institute for Genomic Medicine in Dr. David Goldstein’s lab. He received his Bachelors of Science in Applied Math and Biology from Brown University in 2013. After graduating, Andrew worked as an associate in finance at Amgen for two years before beginning his PhD at Columbia University in 2015. As a graduate student, Andrew’s research focuses on developing methods to model and characterize neuropsychiatric disease using human stem cell derived cultured neuronal networks.
Doctoral Student, Anthropology, Columbia University
Chazelle Rhoden is a third-year doctoral student of anthropology at Columbia University. She conducts research through a transnational black feminist lens on the relationship between climate change conservation and race in Brazil.
Doctoral Student, Performance Studies, New York University
Leticia Robles-Moreno is a PhD student at New York University’s Department of Performance Studies. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Humanities with emphasis in Linguistics and Literature from the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú. She also holds a Master’s degree in Latin American Literature from the University of Colorado at Boulder, and has taught Spanish, Latin American culture, and Writing classes in several college levels.
Graduate Student, Narrative Medicine, Columbia University
Leah Rosen was raised in Denver, CO and graduated from Duke University in Durham, NC. At Duke, she created her own interdisciplinary major titled "Illness and Identity" and completed that in conjunction with the standard pre-med curriculum. She would describe the "Illness and Identity" curriculum as a medical humanities approach to patient-centered care--pulling from disciplines including psychology, neuroscience, philosophy, religious studies, and biology. She is excited to pursue a degree in Narrative Medicine at Columbia and then hopefully continue onto medical school.
PhD Candidate, Latin American and Iberian Cultures, Columbia University
Daniel S. Sáenz is a Colombian-Canadian Settler, writer, art historian, and occasional independent curator based in Lenapehoking (New York City) and Tiohtiá:ke (Montréal). He is currently a Ph.D. student and Teaching Fellow in the Department of Latin American and Iberian Cultures at Columbia University, where he holds a Doctoral Fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Doctoral Student, Creative Writing, The City College of New York
Laura Salvatore is a poet, currently pursuing her MFA in Creative Writing at The City College of New York, where she will be completing her thesis this fall. She studied Art History and English at Southern Connecticut State University.
Doctoral Student, Bioethics, Columbia University
Taylor Santoro is a graduate student in the Bioethics program at Columbia University School of Professional Studies. In May 2017 she graduated with honors from Wake Forest University with a double B.A. in Economics and Studio Art. After graduate school she plans to attend medical school and continue to pursue her research interests in the biomedical field. In her free time she focuses the majority of her time between her passion for cooking and completing her current painting projects!
Doctoral Student, Counseling and Clinical Psychology, Columbia University
Srishti Sardana is a graduate student in the Department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology, in the Global Mental Health Lab, Teachers College, Columbia University. She is also a Research Assistant at the New York State Psychiatric Institute and Columbia University Medical Center. She has assisted on various projects with the aim to build skills needed to conduct high-impact mental health research in low-resource settings.
Doctoral Student, Nursing, Columbia University
Maureen Saylor is currently a student in the Master's Direct Entry program at Columbia University School of Nursing. She also graduated in May 2019 from Mailman School of Public Health with her MPH in Population and Family Health. Previously, she served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Botswana where she primarily worked on projects related to HIV/AIDS and issues surrounding gender-based violence. She is passionate about participatory qualitative research and hopes to pursue a career in community health upon graduating from the MDE program in summer 2020.