Karen Philips

Director of Pre-Health Programs

Dr. Karen Phillips earned her PhD in Chemistry at Columbia University in New York. Her graduate research focused on the synthesis of aggregating helical organic molecules that exhibit liquid crystalline behavior and novel electro-optic properties. Her main research interests at Hunter College are related to innovations in pedagogical practice. In that vein, she has developed and evaluated a collaborative learning framework for Organic Chemistry instruction known as Performance Enhanced Interactive Learning, which she uses regularly in her classroom. Her attention to student learning has been recognized with Hunter’s Presidential Award for Excellence in Teaching as well as the Faculty Innovations in Teaching with Technology Award. Always a strong advocate for students, Dr. Phillips took over the reigns as Director of the Pre-Health Program in 2010. In this capacity, she also oversees Hunter’s Post-Baccalaureate Certificate Program in Health Careers Preparation, and she serves as Director of the Yalow Scholars Program.

Michael Prettyman

Artist, Adjunct lecturer

Michael Prettyman has been a full time artist for twenty years.  He has had shows in galleries and museums in New York, Hong King, Moscow and Barcelona. He explores the subject of myth in his painting and has also been a life-long student of world wisdom traditions. In 2009, he enrolled in the Hunter Religion Department to further pursue these interests. He quickly found what he was looking for—the head of Hunter’s Religion Department, Dr. Sproul, who was a student of Joseph Campbell's—the modern authority on Mythology. Michael has participated in several fellowships, one of which sent him to Nepal to study Thangka painting in Buddhist monasteries. Michael won a research fellowship for a project in which he translated from Sanskrit an ancient Hindu text called the Mahabharata, and made illustrations. Three paintings of his from this project have been shown at a Museum in Moscow.  Since graduating, Michael has been teaching Asian Religions at Hunter as an adjunct, and is continuing to expand the Mahabharata project. Michael and his faculty advisors are finalists for a Guggenheim fellowship, and have a show planned for the American Society of Illustrators.

SciMON Staff

Office of the Provost

Staff from Hunter's Science and Math Opportunities Network work to connect Hunter College students to the extraordinary research and mentoring programs available at Hunter College. They help to provide students with the resources necessary to prepare them for graduate study specifically in sciences and mathematics.

Matthew Bissen

Geography

I am a PhD candidate in Earth and Environmental Science - Geography at the Graduate Center, CUNY.  My work focuses on spatial and social dynamics in the south Bronx.  Prior to embarking on my PhD, I practiced architecture in Seattle and New York City for 15 years designing education-, residential- and performing arts-focused projects.  In addition to this research and practice, I currently teach urban theory at Hunter College and design theory at Parsons the New School for Design.

Emmanuel Garcia

Psychology

I received a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Stony Brook University in May 2010, and a Master of Arts in Psychology in December 2012 from Stony Brook University.  I am interested in central and peripheral nervous system measures of emotional reactivity and emotional regulation related to the development, maintenance and treatment of psychopathology—in particular, anxiety, depression, and traumatic life events.  Currently I work as a Graduate Research Assistant/Lab Co-Coordinator in the Regulation of Emotion in Anxiety and Depression (READ) Lab at Hunter College. I’m also interested in statistics education and basic to advanced statistical methods and models.  

Chelsea Shields

History

Chelsea Schields is a doctoral student in Modern European History at the Graduate Center, CUNY, and a Graduate Teaching Fellow at Queens College.  Her research focuses on the memory of slavery and the evolution of imperial politics in the Netherlands and its Caribbean colonies from the nineteenth century until the present.  In 2008, Chelsea earned her B.A. in History and Anthropology from Goucher College.  She has lived in and studied the languages of the Netherlands and Croatia. 

Inna Soybelman

Physical Therapy

I am a graduate of Macaulay Honors College-Brooklyn college campus. I was a Biology and Psychology double major and chemistry minor as an undergraduate. While an undergraduate, I studied abroad in Santander, Spain. I am currently attending New York University for my Doctorate in Physical Therapy. 

Luis Villegas

Medicine

Prior to Hunter I served in the U.S Army for 6 years.  I graduated from Hunter in 2008 (cum laude) with a B.A in Psychology and English minor.  After Hunter I worked for the Clinical Directors Network, a non-profit research group focused on public health and outcomes research.  Later, I moved to the clinical trial office at Weill Cornell's department of Hematology and Oncology.  There I worked on Phase 1-3 clinical trials in Leukemia and Lymphoma.  Currently, I am a second year medical student, Student for Equal Opportunity in Medicine (SEOM) co-chair, and Publications Director for the Weill Cornell Center for Human Rights.

Katie Brown

Actuary Analyst

Katie currently works as an Actuarial Analyst at Milliman. She obtained a BA in Mathematics from Queens College and a Masters in Statistics from Hunter.

Beth Edelstein

Associate Conservator

Beth Edelstein is Associate Conservator in the Department of Objects Conservation at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, providing examination, documentation, materials identification and conservation treatment for the objects in the Medieval collection. She recently completed the study and conservation of the Museum's Damascus Room, an early-18th century reception room from Syria. She received her master's degree from the Conservation Center, Institute of Fine Arts at New York University in 2003, and has been at the Met since 2004.

Sidney Hankerson

Psychiatrist

Dr. Sidney Hankerson is a psychiatrist who is currently conducting research at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. His research activities are designed to increase mental health treatment for African-Americans by fostering more collaborative relationships between Black Churches and mental health professionals. He completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Virginia, where he majored in Psychology. He then attended Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia. Dr. Hankerson received both his MD degree and Masters in Business Administration (MBA) degree at Emory, which gave him knowledge about methods to increase medical access for underserved populations. He completed his psychiatric residency training at Emory and gathered meaningful insights into the obstacles and beliefs that contribute to health disparities. His long-term goal is to become an expert in providing culturally-sensitive treatments for depression by creating a faith-based mental health system. Dr. Hankerson’s professional affiliations include Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., the Black Psychiatrists of Greater New York & Associates, and the American Psychiatric Association.

Cherbrale Hickman

Pediatrician

Cherbrale is a pediatrician and fellow at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. She specializes in pediatric critical care. Cherbrale went to medical school at the Kansas City University of Medicine and Bioscience.  Her osteopathic (DO) training would be interesting to share since more physicians take the allopathic (MD) route.

Aaron Hudson

Technology Analyst

Aaron, originally from Cleveland, Ohio, landed in Long Island, NY by way of the U.S. Marine Corps. As a former sergeant, Aaron maintained LAN and WAN consisting of over 200 users. After an honorable discharge from the Marines, Aaron started school at LaGuardia Community College and with the guidance of an advisor, applied and was accepted as a scholar with the Kaplan Educational Foundation. Aaron graduated from Syracuse University in 2011 with a Business of Science in Information Management and Technology. At Syracuse, Aaron was the chapter president of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity and was VP of Recruitment for the NAACP Syracuse chapter. Aaron currently works as a Technology Analyst with JPMorgan Chase. He is a proud father of his 10 year old daughter and loves to write and perform poetry.

Adriana Rizzo

Conservation Scientist

Adriana Rizzo is Associate Research Scientist in the Department of Scientific Research at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She graduated in Industrial Chemistry from the University of Venice, Italy, and received a Postgraduate Diploma in the Conservation of Easel Paintings from the Courtauld Institute of Art in London. She has worked at the Met since 2004 conducting analysis of materials from artwork of different periods and cultures, to inform on their technique of manufacture, as well as their conservation. She is interested in the study of organic materials and their degradation, and conservation-related issues.

Suzanne Tamang

Doctoral Student

Suzanne is a member of the Agents Lab at Brooklyn College. Her thesis adviser is Simon Parsons and her work entails the development of new methods for clustering temporal health and medical data. Before starting a doctoral program at the CUNY Graduate Center, Suzanne was a health services researcher for an integrated delivery system in NYC with a focus on the care of the elderly, frail, and those with chronic conditions. After taking a Statistical Natural Language Processing class with Heng Ji in 2010, she became interested in computational methods for natural language processing. In the summers of 2010, 2011, and 2012, Suzanne worked as a visiting Ph.D. student at her Blender Lab on the National Institute of Standards in Technology's annual Knowledge Base Population shared task. Also, in collaboration with community health workers, Suzanne works on a street med mobile app at the Graduate Center's New Media Lab.

Ben Tweardy

Publisher Operations Specialist

Ben grew up in Houston, TX where the thriving oil and aerospace industries inspired him to pursue a degree in Mechanical Engineering upon acceptance to Princeton University. As an undergraduate there, his favorite course focused on the role of entrepreneurship with regard to tech companies that led him to pursue a career at a start up. He now works at the New York based start up, Yext, as a publisher operations specialist.