Vitamin PhD Podcast

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This episode features a chorus of BU graduate school alumni who share how they leverage skills from graduate school to find success in their post-graduate careers. Guests represent sectors ranging from consulting to public history and from arts administration to science writing. They bring varied experience levels, ranging from newly-minted PhDs who recently entered the workforce to mid-career and recently retired professionals. In a culmination of our season’s focus on management and leadership, they touch on management skills, transitions, and the qualities of good leadership. 

Guests include: Bridget Muckian, Marty Blatt, Chenguang Peng, Rebekah Beaulieu,

Kelsey Gustin, Deboki Chakravarti 

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In this episode, the hosts talk with Dr. Joyce Wong about an approach to leadership, which foregrounds collaboration, power, critical self awareness, and relationships. How does identity intersect with approaches to leadership? Especially for minoritized groups such as women and BIPOC working in STEM? And, how is the pandemic affecting leadership in those spaces?

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In this episode, Aly and Emma explore power dynamics that affect learning and working in groups and institutions with Harvard Lecturer Houman Harouni. The conversation addresses topics including group dynamics, power, leadership, social change, self-awareness and relationships in a wide variety of countries and contexts.

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In today's episode, hosts Emma and Aly talk with independent global consultant Debra Wahlberg about project management. Everything from adaptability, interpersonal skills, problem solving, and leadership is discussed. 

Debra Wahlberg is an independent consultant who has provided strategic leadership on international development programs in culturally diverse and politically sensitive environments. She has managed teams across a range of technical areas, including administrative reform, taking market systems approaches to economic growth, strengthening civil society, youth development and more. Debra earned her MSc in Energy Management and Policy from the University of Pennsylvania. 

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In this week's episode, Emma and Aly speak with Joshua Finkelstein, Executive Director of the Boston University Biological Design Center. They speak with him about collaboration and creativity, identifying a gap, risk/reward, and more. They dive into some of the structural problems with innovation, and how these issues tie into leadership.

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In this week's episode, Emma and Aly start off their season with a conversation with Dr. Shari Tishman. Dr. Tishman is a Senior Research Associate at Project Zero, Harvard Graduate School of Education. Her research focuses on the teaching of thinking, the role of close observation in learning, and learning in and through the arts. This week's episodes discusses how to utilize tools within the field of metacognition in teaching and leadership, along with how to continue your personal learning and growth in the teaching field. 

Shari Tishman's Projects/Work:
Arts as Civic Commons
Out of Eden Learn
Agency by Design
Visible Thinking
Artful Thinking
Slow Looking: The Art and Practice of Learning Through Observation

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In this episode, we will be meeting our new hosts for Season 8 of Vitamin PhD, Alyssa Kreikemeier and Emma Bortz. They will be talking with Jenna and Shaunesse', the season 7 hosts, about their most rewarding teaching moments, along with who influences them within the teaching field. The hosts also discuss what the management season will bring for listeners. 

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In this episode, Jenna and Shaunesse’ are joined by guests LaNysha Adams, education consultant and owner of Edlinguist Solutions LLC, and Rhonda Caston, post-doctoral fellow at the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine. This episode, we reach beyond academia to gain insight into how we can use our teaching skills elsewhere. We learn about the challenges and rewards of engaging with learners who may not have experienced traditional education pathways and helping them to navigate the mysteries behind job progress.  

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Today our hosts interview guests for the Special Education episode Vitamin PhD, featuring Stephanie Cox Suárez, a previous associate professor in the Special and Elementary Education Department at BU, and Johny Daniel, an Assistant Professor at Durham University in the UK. Our guests hone in on the importance of not only being passionate about your teaching, but being well-informed for the sake of your students. We learn that special education is as much about caring deeply for your students’ success as it is about finding and utilizing evidence-based practices. Engaging students at every turn of lessons and using all resources available are key practices encouraged in special education according to our hosts.

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We learn the skills behind Online Education in today’s episode of Vitamin PhD from guests John Rindy, Assistant Vice President for Career and Academic Progress, and Brian Danielson, Director of the Center for Teaching  and Learning, both at Slippery Rock University. We touch on the incredible challenge that comes along with educating students virtually, especially in the current era of COVID. Our guests educate us on the importance of developing a goal-oriented mindset to lead to success and how to become marketable to a broad array of career options. Finally, our guests explain the skills it takes to be able to teach in an online classroom and ensure the success of their students, globally.