The UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute diversity committee is thrilled to be able to announce this year’s winners of our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Action Award:
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Mohammed Mostajo-Radji – Research Investigator, Director of the Live Cell Biotechnology Discovery Lab Mohammmed (Mo) is receiving this award for his ongoing efforts to develop remote education opportunities to bring meaningful biology, computational and genomics experiments to underserved students in Monterey Bay, California, South America, and beyond. The committee also wanted to acknowledge his efforts to engage and provide strong mentorship to UC Santa Cruz undergraduate and graduate students as they contribute to this project. |
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Yvonne Vasquez – Graduate Student, Vaske Lab, Member of the Treehouse Childhood Cancer Initiative Yvonne is receiving this award for her ongoing efforts to mentor and encourage female and underrepresented students including, but not limited to, engaging in Girls in Engineering, the Treehouse Undergraduate Bioinformatics Immersion program, and the Science Support Network. She regularly volunteers to teach and support developing scientists in local communities at the middle school and high school levels. |
Mo and Yvonne will be officially presented with their awards at the May 19th Advancing Anti-Racist Genomics Research Symposium, which is currently scheduled to take place from 1-6 in the Baskin Engineering Courtyard. We hope that you will all save the date and plan to join us in celebrating these amazing projects.
We would also like to acknowledge and celebrate the DEI efforts of our runners-up: Melissa Cline, for her consistent mentorship to students from underrepresented groups and advocacy for women in engineering; Susan Carpenter, for her commitment to mentoring of first-generation female scientists and encouraging a culture of engagement with DEI work in her department; and Ann McCartney, who has only been with the Genomics Institute for a short time but whose research and collaborations have helped to create frameworks for including indigenous voices into genomics. One of last year’s DEI Action Award winners, Holly Beale, also received a nomination for her continued work building up the Treehouse Undergraduate Bioinformatics Program.
Adam Novak and Sofie Salama both received a nomination, but were deemed ineligible due to their status as current members of the committee. We continue to be appreciative of their significant contributions both to this committee and the work of DEI on this campus.
Thank you to all of our nominees for your continued support of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. We are looking forward to seeing what new projects and efforts will be created in the future!