CCTS Staff Sessions

Q: What is your role at CCTS?

A: I am the Community Engagement Program Manager

Q: How do you think the CCTS is impacting medicine?

A: The CCTS moves research projects forward by providing research teams with expertise, training, and support across the various disciplines and through each stage of clinical and translational research. We’re strengthening research projects and moving the science forward by improving efficiency, rigor, precision, relevancy, and diversity.

Q: What is one thing you want everyone to know about the CCTS?

A: The support provided by the various programs in the CCTS helps researchers overcome barriers, or even avoid them altogether if research teams come to us in the early stages of the research process. IRB submissions, recruitment plans, stakeholder engagement, community partnerships, grant submissions, study designs, and even research questions become stronger and more competitive when research teams come to the CCTS at the beginning of the process.

Q: What is your favorite thing about the CCTS?

A: The support provided by the various programs in the CCTS helps researchers overcome barriers, or even avoid them altogether if research teams come to us in the early stages of the research process. IRB submissions, recruitment plans, stakeholder engagement, community partnerships, grant submissions, study designs, and even research questions become stronger and more competitive when research teams come to the CCTS at the beginning of the process.

Q: What do you do in your pass-time?

A: I love family and baseball, so my hobbies include genealogy, spending time with my kids, coaching baseball/softball, and going to watch baseball (and college football) games. Go Bucks!

Q: What was your dream job when you were a kid?

A: I wanted to the center fielder for a Major League Baseball team or a U.S. Navy Fighter Pilot.

Q: What's your typical day like?

A: Some things are very different during COVID times, but in many ways it probably sounds the same when I describe it. Getting the kids off to school, starting work (sometimes virtually from home, sometimes from the office) … I guess the biggest change is all of the virtual meetings and providing research consultations via Zoom as opposed to in person.

Q: If you could have a meal with 3 famous people (dead or alive), who would they be and why?

A: Jackie Robinson, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Ian McKellen. They all achieved amazing things and broke through some glass ceilings. Their influence and impact serves as part of the foundation for improving diversity, equity, and inclusion in this country. It would be incredible to hear their stories firsthand.

Q: What is your proudest moment?

A: My proudest moments happen every day as all three of my kids learn and grow. There is nothing that makes me more proud than watching one of them reach a milestone or achieve something important to them. 

Q: Favorite band/song?

A: U2 is my favorite band and my favorite song is “With or Without You.”