Season 9: Self Awareness

Season 9, hosted by Táchira Pichardo (Molecular & Translational Medicine) and Grace McGowan (American & New England Studies), is the fifth season in a series of seven seasons focused on the PhD Core Capacities. In conversation with a diverse range of guests, Grace and Táchira explore how to build the core skill of self-awareness and how to apply that skill to as diverse aspects of life as communication, financial literacy, project management, and the mind-body connection.

Grace McGowan is currently a PhD candidate at Boston University in the American & New England Studies Program. She took her undergraduate degree in English Language and Literature from University of Oxford in 2017. She has held the William V Shannon memorial fellowship at Boston University. Her work explores how Black women writers use the classical tradition from Ancient Greece and Rome in their writing and her paper “I Know I Can’t Change the Future, But I Can

Change the Past: Toni Morrison, Robin Coste Lewis, and the Classical Tradition” was published in Contemporary Women’s Writing under OUP in 2020. Her essay “In ‘Rumors’, Lizzo and Cardi B Pull From the Ancient Greeks, Putting a New Spin on an Old Tradition” was published in both The Conversation and The Boston Globe. Her work on Phillis Wheatley was awarded an honorable mention for the Mary Kelley prize under the New England American Studies Association in 2021.

Táchira is currently a PhD candidate in the Graduate Program in Molecular & Translational Program at the Boston University School of Medicine, where she is studying in the Mazzilli Lab within the Section of Computational Biomedicine. Her research focuses on using a murine model of lung squamous cell carcinoma to characterize the premalignant lesions that precede frank carcinoma, as well as defining the immune contribution to the histological progression of those lesions. She is also interested in using this model for preclinical testing of immunotherapeutic agents, with the eventual goal of working in drug development in the pharmaceutical industry upon completion of her doctoral degree. Táchira is also the president of the Minority & International Scientists Organization (MISO) in the Division of Graduate Medical Sciences, and is passionate about increasing opportunities for underrepresented minorities and women in STEM.

Season 9, Episode 1: Maria Erb on Identity and Advocacy

In this episode, our hosts speak with Maria Erb, Director of the Boston University Newbury Center for First-Generation Students, about using self-awareness to accept our various identities and advocate for ourselves as well.

Maria Dykema Erb, M.Ed. is the inaugural director of the Newbury Center which was established to foster the holistic development and success of first-generation undergraduate, graduate, and professional students at Boston University (BU). Prior to joining BU, Maria has held numerous positions at The University of Vermont, Elon University, and Duke University. Most recently, she served as Co-Director of Diversity & Student Success in The Graduate School at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where she established multiple diversity and inclusion initiatives at the graduate education level, including the Carolina Grad Student F1RSTS for first-generation graduate and professional students. As a proud first-generation graduate, she has a BS from the University of New Hampshire and an MEd in Interdisciplinary Studies from The University of Vermont.

Season 9, Episode 2: Dr. Emily Roberts and Self-Awareness in Finances PART 1

Today the hosts are speaking to Dr. Emily Roberts, Owner of Personal Finance for PhDs. This is part 1 of an episode discussing how we can use self-awareness to take control of our finances and set ourselves up for a fiscally sustainable and successful future.

Dr. Emily Roberts is a personal finance educator specializing in early-career PhDs. Through her business, Personal Finance for PhDs, she equips graduate students, postdocs, and PhDs with Real Jobs to make the most of their money. She gives seminars at universities and for associations; interviews graduate students and PhDs on her podcast; and creates courses and workshops on taxes, investing, and more. Emily holds a PhD in biomedical engineering from Duke University and lives in southern California with her husband and two children.

Season 9, Episode 3: Dr. Emily Roberts and Self-Awareness in Finances PART 2

Today the hosts finish their conversation with Dr. Emily Roberts, Owner of Personal Finance for PhDs. This is part 2 of an episode discussing how we can use self-awareness to take control of our finances and set ourselves up for a fiscally sustainable and successful future.

Season 9, Episode 4: Dr. Hannah Čulík-Baird on Self-Awareness Within Academia and Long-Term Projects

Hannah Čulík-Baird, author of Cicero and the Early Latin Poets (Cambridge University Press 2022), is an Assistant Professor of Classical Studies at Boston University with specializations in Latin literature and fragments.

Season 9, Episode 5: Dr. Susanna Harris on Self-Awareness in Communication and Advocacy

Dr. Susanna Harris is a science communicator and multimedia marketer specializing in health sciences company growth. Susanna has achieved success as a leader in scientific communications, community engagement, and optimizing social media platforms by bringing her passion as a researcher and spokesperson for Ph.D. students in mental health advocacy and the promotion of scientific education and accessibility. Working as the manager of engagement and communications for a biotech accelerator, Susanna optimizes the value of collaborations and support of entrepreneurs and management teams of life science startups. Susanna is the founder and chairperson of PhD Balance, an international community platform empowering graduate students to thrive personally and professionally.

Susanna can be found across social media platforms at @SusannaLHarris and SusannaLHarris.com while PhD Balance can be found at @PhD_Balance and at www.PhDBalance.com

Season 9, Episode 6: Dr. Esther Jones on Self-Awareness in our Graduate and Professional Lives

ESTHER L. JONES is Associate Provost and Dean of the Faculty at Clark University, where she is a tenured professor in the department of English and the E. Franklin Frazier Chair of African American Literature, Theory and Culture. Her research specializations include black women’s health and medical ethics as represented in black speculative fiction. She is the author of Medicine and Ethics in Black Women’s Speculative Fiction (2015), and the editor-in-chief for “Critical Medical Humanities in Global Context: Race and Ethnicity across the World,” a reference text under contract with Palgrave MacMillan.

Jones has served as the inaugural Associate Provost & Dean of the Faculty since 2018, where she has grown the role to take on increasing levels of responsibility over time. With an initial mandate to support faculty morale and development as an office of one, Jones succeeded in developing and implementing a range of fresh faculty development initiatives that span the full professional career and life cycle of faculty from onboarding to retirement, to renewal of focus and energy for midcareer faculty. Over the past year and a half, she has grown the office to include two associate deans (part time faculty administrators), one full time assistant dean, and oversight of the Center for Excellence in Teaching & Learning, and the Center for Gender, Race and Area Studies. More recent duties include overseeing departmental external review processes, department chair development and training, and tenure track faculty hiring.

On the national stage, Jones serves on the Executive Board of the Phi Beta Kappa Society in the roles of Vice President, Chair of the Phi Beta Kappa Foundation, and Co-Chair of Phi Beta Kappa’s Futures Task Force alongside President Peter Quimby. The Phi Beta Kappa Foundation oversees fiscal responsibility of the society and is responsible for convening the Foundation’s Investments Committee. The Phi Beta Kappa Futures task force, created at the 2021 Triennial Council in preparation for the 250th anniversary of the society, is tasked with exploring strategies for how the society will play a role in the transformative potential of a liberal arts and sciences education in society for the generations to come.