10 minute read
New York health
New York connection
Summer program trains students in various aspects of healthcare
By Kora Burton
Top left: Avni Ahuja takes in the sights of New York. Top right: Emma Tucker and Samia McEachin eat lunch together in Central Park. This photo: Avni and Emma join Susan Waltman for a performance at Carnegie Hall. Facing page: Samia McEachin, right, turned an internship with Susan Waltman into a job after graduation.
Future physicians Avni Ahuja and Emma Tucker arrived in New York this past summer ready to learn more about healthcare, and flew back to Athens with a desire to expand their medical careers in new directions.
The Honors students, who are also Foundation Fellows, participated in an eight-week internship with the Greater New York Hospital Association (GNYHA) through the Honors in New York internship program.
Every year, two Honors students are selected to travel to New York and work with GNYHA, which provides advocacy for their member hospitals and resources for them in terms of wellness and regulation. Working behind the scenes at GNYHA gives students a new understanding of the major players in healthcare and how they interact. A cornerstone of the Honors in New York internship program is the unique mentorship of its coordinator, Susan Waltman. An alumna of the UGA Honors Program—she earned her bachelor’s degree in sociology and master’s in social work before receiving her law degree from Columbia University— Susan serves as GNYHA’s executive vice president of legal, regulatory, and professional affairs and its vice president of legal and general counsel.
Avni, a senior studying sociology, and Emma, a junior studying biochemistry and molecular biology, share about their time in New York below.
Describe Susan’s impact on your experience. Emma: “Susan had the dual goal of allowing us to work on projects related to our interests and to push us to explore outside of our comfort zones. The team put us to work on pretty substantial projects, legal issues especially. I ended up discovering an unexpected interest in emergency preparedness.” Avni: “Sometimes Susan would pop by our desks in the middle of the day. It was really special that even though she is an executive vice president, she prioritized us. You don’t always have a mentor like that.” How did the program help shape your future goals? Avni: “I have been trying to balance my interest in public health and advocacy and social justice
Susan Waltman provides Honors students with a healthcare view of New York
Even though she’s a New Jersey native and has been a resident of New York for most of her professional life, for Susan Waltman (AB ’73, MSW ’75), staying engaged with the University of Georgia has been easy. She just brings some of the UGA’s most talented students to her.
Waltman is the executive vice president and general counsel for the Greater New York Hospital Association (GNYHA), a center for healthcare advocacy and expertise that serves more than 50 hospitals across the New York region.
In 2005, Waltman started an internship program that brings two UGA Honors students to GNYHA for two months each summer. The placements are ideal for students with interests in public health, health administration, and health policy. In addition to informal visits throughout the work day, Waltman schedules weekly lunches with her interns to check their progress, address concerns, and celebrate triumphs.
Once the internship is over, the relationship with the students often isn’t. Waltman has written her fair share of recommendation letters for graduate schools, medical schools, and all sorts of jobs. She receives frequent emails from past interns as well.
“From day one, Susan made me feel welcome,” said Eytan Palte (AB ’16), who interned the summer after his sophomore year. “She was a wonderful mentor, always helping me find projects and people to talk to and learn from.”
After graduating from UGA, Eytan moved back to New York to attend medical school at Columbia. One of his recommendation letters was written by Waltman.
“It’s been such a rewarding experience,” she said. “I really think that this is the best thing that I do in my life: meeting and working with these wonderful young people.”
Another of the interns was Samia McEachin (AB ’18, BSHP ’18). She interned at GNYHA two summers ago, graduated last summer with a degree in health promotion, and started her job as a project manager for emergency preparedness with GNYHA in January.
In the years since Superstorm Sandy caused billions of dollars of damage to the New York area, emergency preparedness has taken on increased importance. For instance, with a mild late-afternoon February snowstorm on the way, Samia spent the morning in a conference call with dozens of hospital administrators making sure they were ready for any weather-related traffic injuries or problems.
Day-to-day responsibilities mean that Waltman and Samia don’t get to see as much of each other as they did during
her internship, but the mentee knows her mentor isn’t far away.
“It’s invaluable having mentors to guide you and also give you the freedom to explore something that interests you,” Samia said.
Waltman’s dedication to helping the next generation has not gone unnoticed in Athens. In 2009, she received the Honors Program’s top award for alumni and friends, the Jere W. Morehead Award. In 2017, she received the Blue Key Service Award, one of the highest honors given to a member of the UGA community.
“It’s fascinating when you receive an honor for what you think is just the right thing to do, which is give back to your school,” said Waltman, who also serves on the UGA Foundation Board of Trustees. “I am made better and richer by being able to work with people like Samia and Eytan.” - Eric Rangus, Georgia magazine, June 2019
with wanting to become a physician. The internship definitely made me see how I could have a role and career as a physicianpolicymaker.” Emma: “The internship opened my eyes to having a career more involved with the legal and regulatory side of medicine, though I am still very much focused on the clinical side.” Was there an event this summer that really stood out to you? Emma: “We had a delegation from Columbia come in to talk about emergency preparedness and workplace wellness. We didn’t discover until they got there that they didn’t speak any English, so I was able to help with translating, having just spent a semester in Spain. The fact that I was not only allowed to sit in on this meeting, but also take an active role in translating, speaks to the trust and responsibility that Susan Waltman and our other GNYHA mentors placed in us as interns.” Avni: “One moment that really summed up the culture of GNYHA was our farewell lunch. Susan planned it and invited people from across the office who I actually got to work with on projects. That final lunch and the culmination of the experience with all those different figures and mentors throughout my internship was really special.” Tell us about the power of the UGA network in New York. Emma: “It was never lonely in the big city. There are so many UGA students and alumni there.” Avni: “I felt very connected, not like I was just doing this internship in a random void.” What was your favorite part about the internship? Emma: “It’s very self-directed. I really valued that autonomy.” Avni: “Everyone in the office really wanted me to have a wonderful summer. It was a good environment and culture. This was a truly unique opportunity.”
Emma McMorran flips through an art history book in the Art Library at the Lamar Dodd School of Art, where she conducts the majority of her research.
A CURO Summer Fellow studies one artist's impact on an art form that started making waves a century ago
Emma’s
summer Story and photos by Kora Burton
This past summer, Honors junior Emma McMorran took the opportunity to stay on campus and dive into her research on The Evolution of the Readymade: How Jasper Johns Altered History under the direction of Isabelle Wallace, associate professor of art history in the Lamar Dodd School of Art. She was funded by the CURO Summer Fellows program. Emma is studying art history and minoring in English in addition to earning a certificate in museum studies. Her experience through the program’s funding allowed her to deeply invest her time researching Johns, which translated to an even deeper appreciation for her chosen subject.
“My project dealt with the concept of ‘the readymade’ and how that concept within art history transitioned from the time of Marcel Duchamp to Jasper Johns,” said Emma, who is a CURO Honors Scholar. Readymade is an appropriated, or everyday, object positioned as a work of art. The readymade movement
began in the early 20th century with Duchamp, who made art out of found objects.
Emma’s interest is in the work of Jasper Johns in the 1950s and 1960s.
“Johns took the concept of the readymade and repositioned it through his creation of Flag,” Emma said, “which is a painting of an American flag, not altered in any way. It’s just a flag on a canvas, but he added aesthetic interest to it because he was able to add his distinct painting patterns and brush marks.”
What really fascinated Emma about her project is the “evolution over time of how a concept in art history can seem so radical at its conception but then becomes blasé 100 years later,” she said. “It’s why I wanted to study the evolution of the term and how Jasper Johns served as a catalyst for the readymade.”
Emma’s relationship with Wallace, an expert on Jasper Johns and contemporary art, laid a strong foundation for the project.
“Emma was very proactive and independent in her research,” Wallace said. “It’s interesting to see where students go when not guided by the structure of a traditional course. Her research reminded me of just how strange and opaque ‘the readymade’ is for people outside of the field of art.”
Being a researcher in the humanities when research is often equated to STEM fields was exciting for Emma.
“I really love getting to do research within the arts because it’s something that is not appreciated as much as it should be,” Emma said. “There aren’t that many undergraduate researchers within art history, and there is a lack of undergraduate students who are seeking research opportunities, specifically within the arts and humanities.”
As an Honors teaching assistant, or HTA, Emma leads a section of HONS 1000H seminars. HTAs are peer mentors for first-year Honors students, and Emma encourages those who are considering research to take advantage of UGA’s opportunities, especially through the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities.
“Whenever I talk to them about CURO, I really try to emphasize that undergraduate research is for people of all disciplines and that it’s not just for people in STEM,” she said. “There is funding and there are opportunities available for people within the humanities.” This fall, Emma focused on modernism and the work of Alfred Stieglitz. In the late 19th and early 20th century, Stieglitz transformed photography into an actual art form at a time when nobody considered photography as a form of art.
In the future, she wants to curate contemporary art and advocate for the inclusion of underrepresented populations in the visitor profiles of museums and galleries.
CURO Summer Fellowship
Each year, the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities, which is housed within the Honors Program, awards 30 summer fellowships to support UGA undergraduates interested in pursuing intensive, immersive, faculty-mentored research. Each recipient receives a $3,000 stipend. Students spend about 320 hours conducting research, present at a summer forum and the CURO Symposium, and benefit from CURO Summer Fellowship workshops and activities.
