American Physician Scientists Association August 2022 Newsletter

 

Want some expert advice on dual-degree secondary applications? Have questions about secondaries? Come attend the next APSA Supporting Applicants Interactive Session where we will host a panel of current dual-degree students ready to talk about all things secondary apps! The webinar is on August 4, 2022, @ 7pm EST, completely FREE, and open to all! Register here (https://tinyurl.com/Aug4APSA) to attend this highly valuable session. For more information, as well as an application FAQ document, please visit our website: www.physicianscientists.org/page/interactive-series.

University of Pittsburgh APSA Chapter Letter Writing Workshop The APSA at PittMed Advocacy Committee is planning a series of drop-in workshops beginning in Fall 2022 for physician-scientists and trainees to write letters to scientific journals, news outlets, and policymakers advocating for evidence-based reform in healthcare and social services. We invite you to fill out our general interest survey to help shape the focus of these events: https://forms.gle/SvHtvm3NqaGZVDow5 To accommodate all participants, these workshops will be held over Zoom (with closed captions) or in hybrid format as Covid permits. Questions regarding accessibility or other aspects of this workshop series can be directed to Brittany Egnot (bre31@pitt.edu) or Anu Ajith (ana205@pitt.edu).

Welcome our 2022-2023 APSA Executive Council!

Briana Christophers, Co-chair of Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) Committee

Born and raised in Miami, Briana (Bri) Christophers moved to New Jersey to attend Princeton University, where she fell in love with developmental biology while staring at fish hearts down a microscope in the lab of Rebecca Burdine, PhD. She continued her journey in developmental biology by working in the lab of Robert Heuckeroth, MD, PhD at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, moving from the heart to the mouse enteric nervous system. Now as an MD-PhD student at Weill Cornell/Rockefeller/Sloan Kettering Tri-Institutional MD-PhD Program, she is pursuing graduate training with Mary Baylies, PhD, studying muscle development in Drosophila. Her aim is to pursue an academic career as a physician-scientist in pediatrics, bringing social justice to the lab bench and hospital bedside. Briana has continued to bring together her passion for scientific discovery and advocacy, serving as diversity representative on the Weill Cornell Medical Student Executive Committee, co-running the Association of Diverse Physician-Scientists in Training (ADePT), and developing the Mini Lessons by Medical Scientists video series aimed at introducing children and adolescents to physician-scientists. On Twitter, Bri is an advocate for people of color, children, and medical trainees. She co-runs the Twitter community @LatinasInMed, in addition to being an editor and team author of The Free Guide to Medical School Admissions. She started working with APSA on the diversity ad-hoc committee organized after the organization’s first diversity summit in 2018 and will continue this work in her second year as co-chair of the Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) committee.

Alex Chen, Member-at-large, Social Sciences and Humanities

Alex Chen is an eighth year MD-PhD candidate in anthropology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Trained in architecture, his dissertation research examines biocontainment design, race, and laboratory infrastructures in the United States. This is Alex’s first year on the APSA Executive Council as Member-at-Large, Social Sciences and Humanities. As an aspiring physician-designer-anthropologist, Alex hopes to work on strengthening healthcare infrastructures with attention to global equity and racial justice. Alex is also committed to diversity and equity efforts through teaching and writing. When not binging online videos, Alex enjoys traveling, eating, and building his collection of architecture and cooking books.