Larry Spotted Crow Mann is a citizen of the Nipmuc Tribe of Massachusetts. He is an award-winning writer, poet, cultural educator, Traditional Storyteller, tribal drummer /dancer and motivational speaker involving youth sobriety, cultural and environmental awareness. Mann is also the Co-director of the Ohketeau Cultural Center and Founder of the Native Youth Empowerment Foundation. He is also a former board member of the Nipmuk Cultural Preservation Trust, which is an organization set up to promote the cultural, social and spiritual needs of Nipmuc people as well an educational resource of Native American studies. Mann also served as a Review Committee Member, at The Native American Poets Project at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology. Mann has traveled to many parts of the world to schools, colleges, pow wows and other organizations sharing the music, culture, and history of Nipmuc people.
Sheila Thomas, PhD is a faculty member in the Department of Medicine at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Dean of Academic Programs and Diversity for the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) at Harvard University. As a faculty, her lab focused on defining networks that controlled basic cellular processes and how deregulation of these networks contributes to cancer. She has also been actively involved in teaching and mentoring of both undergraduates and graduate students and has served in various leadership roles for one of the graduate programs at Harvard University.
In her role as a Dean, she oversees two areas. As Dean of Diversity, she is responsible for overseeing diversity, equity and inclusion and belonging efforts for GSAS’s 58 programs. Her team is committed to creating, identifying and implementing initiatives to diversify the Academy at all levels and the numerous sectors into which our graduates enter and creating an environment where all students can thrive. Through these efforts, GSAS has gone from 5% of its US population being from underrepresented groups in 2010 to now 19%. As Dean of Academic Programs, her team works closely with the Academic Dean of the Graduate School and faculty in the programs/departments to support the academic and professional development of PhD and Master’s students. This includes working with departments to foster new secondary fields and degree programs and developing workshops and providing individualized consultations through our Fellowships and Writing Center.
Talia Hart is a 4th year PhD candidate in Biological and Biomedical Sciences Program at Harvard Medical School completing her doctoral studies in the Soukas Lab. Talia did her undergraduate work at San Francisco State University investigating the role of plasticity in cell fate determination during early frog development. During her time there, she was awarded NIH Maximizing Access to Research Careers (NIH MARC) fellowship. She also was a SACNAS member at the SFSU chapter. In 2016, Talia attended the SACNAS conference in Long Beach, CA where she was awarded Best Undergraduate Poster Presentation.
Currently in the Soukas lab, Taliais looking at the anti-diabetic medication, metformin, and its health benefits on aging and cancer. Taliaaims to understand altered nuclear transport of proteins in response to the drug and how the nuclear pore complex is affected in aging. She was the recipient of the CGM 2019 Retreat Poster Presentation Award. With her extra time, Taliais involved in several organizations at Harvard including the Minority Biomedical Scientists at Harvard (MBSH), the GSAS Latinx Student Association (LSA) and the Harvard Biotechnology club.
Kellie Ann Jurado is a Presidential Assistant Professor in the Microbiology Department at University of Pennsylvania. Her research program is interested in emerging viral pathogenesis and in delineating antiviral immune control mechanisms at the maternal-fetal interface and in the central nervous system. She completed her postdoctoral training in Immunobiology with Akiko Iwasaki at Yale and earned her PhD with Alan Engelman at Harvard University. She is the recipient of many prestigious grants and fellowships, including the L’Oreal for Women in Science Award and mostly recently the Linda Montague Investigator Award.