Outreach and Mentorship

Microbiome science for anthropologists

I am a strong proponent of making microbiome science more accessible to anthropologists and human biologists of all career stages. My collaborators and I continue to develop “field-friendly” methods for sample collection alongside resources for analyzing microbiome data. Through this work we combine perspectives and tools from anthropology, microbial ecology, evolutionary biology, and bioinformatics.

Research Mentor

As a part of my PhD dissertation, I provided hands-on training to minority-identifying undergraduate students at Northwestern. This included training in microbiome sample collection, laboratory methods, bioinformatics and statistical approaches, and manuscript writing.

Youth Science Mentor

As a Science Club Mentor, I met with teams of middle-school students to work on science projects. Science Club is supported by the Boys & Girls Club of Chicago and Northwestern University’s Science in Society program.

Co-Lead, Duke Global Health Institute’s Equity Task Force

The Equity Task Force was formed in June 2020 to address systemic racism within higher education and global health research. As an alumna of the Institute, I co-led a working group that focused on global health education, including decolonizing the curriculum and improving equity in international research.

STEM Workshops

I volunteered with multiple educational programs at Northwestern and in the broader community. This included a STEM conference for middle-school girls who are traditionally underrepresented in the sciences, as well as an event for high-school students from the Chicagoland area that provides exposure to new topics in a university setting.

Pen Pal Program

I started a program that matches Northwestern scientists with students from a nearby elementary school that serves a racially and socioeconomically diverse student body.