Recently my colleague and office buddy, Nadia Johnson, was featured in the Spring 2012 issue of Inquiry, Northwestern University’s School of Education and Social Policy’s (SESP) quarterly magazine, in an article entitled, “Higher Education Student Nadia Johnson: Motivating Girls to Study Science.” Nadia is the Co-Director for the Women’s Health Science Program (WHSP) and a graduate student at Northwestern pursuing a master’s degree in SESP’s Higher Education Administration and Policy program. Inquiry featured her as a student and Northwestern staff member who is making a difference in the lives of young women through science education.

As the Co-Director for WHSP, Nadia runs the Oncofertility Saturday Academy, along with programs in cardiology, physical science, and infectious diseases. The programs focus on bringing in girls who are under-represented in science and medicine, namely African American and Latina women, for a series of workshops open to high school juniors and seniors.  According to Nadia, “ When it comes to teaching science, we must better understand how boys and girls experience the science setting differently and how we can manage this so that girls can get just as far as boys.”

This past November, the WHSP program received the prestigious Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering demonstrating the enormous impact this program has had on young women in science. For Nadia, the formula is simple, “If you excel in something and you have praise, you tend to go down that path,” as was the case for her. She also emphasizes the importance of having young women mentored by female scientists and clinicians so they see firsthand, women who are working and exceling in science fields.

Not one to rest on her morals, Nadia is using her graduate research to improve the WHSP program and make the experience not only significant for the high school students, but also for program mentors (health care providers, medical students, faculty, etc…) who also participate.  Regardless of what the data shows, Nadia knows from experience that these kinds of programs, are a win-win for everyone involved.  Read, “Higher Education Student Nadia Johnson: Motivating Girls to Study Science.”

By Nadia Johnson, Co-Director of the Oncofertility Saturday Academy

On Saturday, February 18^th, 31 high school girls hailing from six different local Chicago high schools celebrated the culmination of the sixth annual Oncofertility Saturday Academy (OSA) with a family day and graduation event. OSA is the flagship academy of the Women’s Health Science Program, the award-winning science education program that aims to inspire high school girls from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds to pursue careers in science and medicine. OSA consists of a junior academy (JOSA) geared toward laboratory sciences, and a senior academy (SOSA) geared toward clinical sciences. Each academy includes weekly homework assignments, and three on-campus days filled with hands-on laboratory or clinical activities, workshops on such topics as sexual health and applying to medical school, and panel discussions with students or professionals in the field.

During family day, students demonstrate how much they have learned during the five-week program by presenting a capstone project, and rotating through stations that cover some of the academy topics with their families. For example, the SOSA students take their parents’ blood pressure (a skill they learned during the “Doctor for a Day” session) and the JOSA students show their parents how female fertility can be preserved through the use of follicle isolation and preservation in alginate beads (a technique pioneered by the Woodruff and Shea labs, that they learn about during the “Regulation of Ovarian Function” session).

Graduation follows family day, and is a chance for everyone – parents, siblings, and friends of the OSA students, and the over 100 OSA volunteers – to celebrate the accomplishments of the girls who were motivated and dedicated enough to complete homework assignments every week, and get up extra early on Saturdays to attend the on-campus all-day sessions. Each student gives a short speech before accepting her certificate and OSA patch. One student, a senior at Roberto Clemente High School, started her speech with: “I am very honored to be part of this program, this is the first year that it was opened to Chicago Public Schools [so] I am fortunate to be here.” Up until this year, the OSA program was only available to students from the Young Women’s Leadership Charter School. With the help of many teachers and advisors throughout the Chicago Public School system, the program leaders were able to offer the program to other qualified students this year; in addition to Clemente and Young Women’s, OSA student hailed from four other schools: Kenwood Academy, King College Prep, Lindblom Math and Science Academy, and Instituto Health and Science Career Academy.

Many other students commented on their favorite experiences during the academy in their graduation speeches. Several SOSA students remarked that using the da Vinci surgical robot, a $1.5 million system used for minimally invasive gynecologic procedures, during the “Oncofertility & Surgery” session, was their favorite part of OSA. Most of the students thanked their mentors – JOSA girls were partnered with scientist mentors and SOSA girls we paired with first year medical students. The girls were proud of what they had accomplished, and recounted their experiences during the program with a mixture of gratitude and amazement. One student, a senior at Young Women’s Leadership Charter School, concluded her graduation speech with a quote from author Sarah Caldwell: “Learn everything you can, anytime you can, from anyone you can – There will always come a time in your life, when you will be grateful that you did.”

It may appear that the OSA program is designed to teach high school girls about cancer, reproductive biology, and oncofertility, but the program strives to teach so much more than that. It is a program designed to empower young women with knowledge about their own bodies; a program with over 100 university staff, student, and faculty volunteers, who serve as role models and mentors during the program; a program looking to change the face of science and medicine. OSA is a program that takes young women who are willing to learn, and hopes to turn them into the scientists, physicians and leaders of tomorrow.

Ever wonder what an embryo looks like as it develops? How one sperm “beats out” all of the others to fertilize an egg? What about the steps needed to become a researcher who studies these processes? Join the Oncofertility Saturday Academy at the Penn Academy for Reproductive Sciences.

If you are a girl in 10th, 11th, or 12th grade, join us in taking a firsthand look at reproductive health and fertility from scientists and doctors directly involved in this field. In an all-female workshop full of scientific discussions, demonstrations, and hands-on labs, we will examine current research in reproductive health. We will also discuss oncofertility, or new methods to preserve fertility in female cancer patients whose chemotherapy may be harmful to their eggs, making it difficult for these women to have their own genetic child. Topics to be covered include the physiology and anatomy of the female reproductive system through mouse dissection, demonstration of fertilization and development of the embryo, examination of a scientific journal article, discussion of the ethics of decision-making in science, and presentation of a variety of careers in science.

The dates for the Saturday workshops are March 10, 17, 24, 31 and April 14 and 21 (Note: There will not be a session on April 7, 2012). Each session will be held from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. at the University of Pennsylvania. Participants must be able to attend all six sessions of the workshop to apply. SEPTA tokens can be provided for daily transportation if necessary; the need for tokens does not affect eligibility.

For more information and to register, download the application!

It is only January and already the Oncofertility Saturday Academies (OSA) are off to a busy start. Last weekend, Mary Zelinski, PhD, who heads one of the Oncofertility Consortium‘s research projects, launched this year’s Oregon academy at the Oregon Primate Research Center (ONPRC). A group of 10 high school students comprised of eight girls and two boys got an overview of oncofertility and a tour of the research center. The students come from different schools, two of them driving up to an hour to attend the Saturday programs.

In addition to a tour of the primate center, the OSA students performed hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) staining on sectioned ovaries. This coming weekend, they will have the opportunity to view these sections under a microscope. H&E staining is widely used in biological research as it stains the cell nucleus blue and other structures a pink or red color.  This year, the Oregon OSA will meet in the newly completed Science Learning Lab at the ONPRC. The educational research lab, supported by a generous grant from a private donor, can accommodate up to 24 students and will greatly expand the opportunities available for visitors to interact with Primate Center researchers. An open house will be held tomorrow, Friday, January 27^th and will provide the OSA students a place to learn about oncofertility and basic science research over the next few weeks.

Simultaneously, tomorrow is the launch of the Chicago OSA program with juniors and seniors in high school from five schools in the Chicagoland area. In the next few weeks we will, continue to share more about both of these exceptional programs, and the OSA programs at the University of Pennsylvania and University of California at San Diego.

Recently there has been a lot of attention brought to the concept of collaboration in academia, specifically in the sciences. Gone are the days (at least in our niche) where disciplines drew a dividing line in the sand – scientists keep to one side of the room, humanities, you go play in the other corner, etc… We understand that there cannot be one without the other and the more we can begin to build a “common language,” the better off we will be as researchers, academics, students and all around everyday people.

One of the many areas that the Oncofertility Consortium has implemented a collaborative paradigm is in the Oncofertility Saturday Academies (OSA) held throughout the country. Young women in high school from diverse backgrounds are engaged in the basic sciences, the social sciences and the humanities. We open up our lab and say, “please come in, we’d like to show you what we’re doing and teach you how to be a better scientist too.”

Some areas we focus on in our Saturday Academy along with lab work are the ethical, social, legal and religious implications of oncofertility research. Dr. Laurie Zoloth, Oncofertility Consortium member and Professor of Medical Humanities and Bioethics at Northwestern University, has been a key component of the Ethics curriculum in OSA over the last 5 years.  According to Dr. Zoloth, “one of the most important things about doing research in reproductive health is thinking about the implications for human societies, human communities and the ethical implications that each individual faces.”

Dr. Zoloth and her students put together a 2-hour course for the young women, introducing them to basic definitions, theory and a case-based method of ethical decision-making in order to demonstrate the complicated and important questions that oncofertility raises. Dr. Zoloth says, “the attempt of our section is to broaden their understanding of the competing and sharply different moral arguments that attend to this research so that they know what the basic definitions, initial conversations, and arguments that have been made to objections raised from religion and moral philosophy are to this kind of research.”

At the Oncofertility Consortium, we believe that it is imperative that the future of science be a collaborative initiative and this is the basis through which we developed our national OSA program 5 years ago. According to Dr. Zoloth, “the complex decisions that are invoked by their [research] have to be apart of their science as well. So we teach [the girls] right along with the science, so they’ll understand how intertwined the work of a scientist is with the concerns of their society.”

Stay tuned for Part 2…

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The Oncofertility Saturday Academy, a national program to educate high school students originated at the Women’s Health Science Program, which just received a Presidential Award for excellence in mentoring. Here are the details!

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Latina and African American high-school girls are prepared for science, health careers

By Marla Paul

CHICAGO — A program for mentoring urban minority high-school girls for college and careers in science and health was awarded the prestigious Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring by President Barack Obama. The mentors will receive the awards at a White House ceremony later this year.

The Women’s Health Science Program for High School Girls and Beyond, a five-year-old program at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, targets primarily African American and Latina girls from disadvantaged backgrounds in Chicago. The young women can study at four different Northwestern academies: cardiology, physical science, infectious disease and oncofertility. The girls’ science program is part of the Institute for Women’s Health Research at the Feinberg School.

“We’re delighted that President Obama recognized the impact of mentoring the next generation of female scientists and leaders and are humbled by the recognition of this award,” said Teresa Woodruff, director of the Institute for Women’s Health Research and the Thomas J. Watkins Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Feinberg. “By helping women and girls we can help change the world.”

The White House award recognizes the crucial role mentoring plays in the academic and personal development of students studying science and engineering—particularly those who belong to groups that are underrepresented in these fields. By offering their expertise and encouragement, mentors help prepare the next generation of scientists and engineers, while ensuring that tomorrow’s innovators reflect and benefit from the diverse talent of the United States.

“Through their commitment to education and innovation, these individuals and organizations are playing a crucial role in the development of our 21st century workforce,” President Obama said. “Our Nation owes them a debt of gratitude for helping ensure that America remains the global leader in science and engineering for years to come.”

Of the 90 students who have participated in the Women’s Health Science Program from the Young Women’s Leadership Charter School in Chicago, 18 are seniors in high school, 70 are attending college, and two have received undergraduate degrees.  Of those attending college, 51 percent are pursuing science majors.

Woodruff plans to expand the science program to other high schools in the Chicago area. The program also has grown beyond Chicago through Woodruff’s efforts.  Similar informal education programs based on the Chicago model are now running in San Diego, Portland and Philadelphia.

Woodruff, a reproductive endocrinologist, researches female reproductive health and infertility and is chief of the division of fertility preservation at the Feinberg School. She also leads the Oncofertility Consortium, a national a team of oncologists, fertility specialists, social scientists, educators and policy makers to translate her research to the clinical care of women who will lose their fertility due to cancer treatment.  In addition, she has been an advocate for sex and gender inclusivity and study in basic science, translational studies and clinical trials.

Read more about the national group of Oncofertility Academy Programs!
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MEDIA CONTACT: Marla Paul at (312) 503-8928 or marla-paul@northwestern.edu

NORTHWESTERN NEWS: www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/

The 2011 Oncofertility Consortium Conference incorporated many new activities and attendees. One new special group of attendees were high school students from the Oncofertility Saturday Academy, the informal science outreach program run by the investigators of the Oncofertility Consortium around the country. A new scientists in the group, Katy Ebbert had the chance to spend some time with these young ladies and told us about her experiences with them.

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Photo by Galdones Photography

By Katy Ebbert—As an offshoot of the Oncofertility Consortium Conference that took place October 12-14^th in Chicago, high-school students from Chicago, Philadelphia, and San Diego convened to learn about the field of fertility preservation and to explore the possibilities of pursuing an education in the sciences. These young women are all students of the Oncofertility Saturday Academy, the education outreach program of the consortium. The students not only attended most of the consortium’s presentations, but they also displayed their own posters and answered questions about the research with which they had been personally involved. Over the course of the three days the girls were exposed to the progress made by the researchers of the consortium, as well as they were given a glimpse into anticipated research and future projects.

Having recently received my bachelor’s degree from Northwestern University, I accompanied the girls on their trip to Northwestern’s Evanston Campus where they attended an info session and participated in a tour of the campus. Interested students were also given a quick showing of Dr. Tom O’Halloran’s laboratory in the new Silverman building on the northern end of campus. A whirlwind experience, the girls were greeted by the lively environment provided by the giant purple-shirted crowds from undergraduate orientation and were given an overview of the scientific community present at the university.

Personally, I found the girls themselves to be the most impressive part of the experience. These young women were attentive, well-spoken, and clearly driven to achieve. Eager to have their questions answered, the girls pressed the staff at the Office of Administration with questions pertaining to courses available in each school, application requirements, and many expressed a particular interest in the seven-year Honors Program in Medical Education series (a 7 year program which offers direct entry into Northwestern’s medical school). To put it simply, they kept their tour guides very busy.  It became immediately clear to me that these girls had long-term goals in mind while attending the Oncofertility Consortium Conference. They were passionate about science already at their young age, and they seemed both excited and committed to the idea of exploring all options available to them as they approached the next chapter in their education. Overall, it was a wonderful trip, and I have no doubt that either at Northwestern University or elsewhere, these young women are prepared to excel.

Summer Teacher Fellowship Team (L-R): Mark Prosise (Curriculum Developer), Amy Elliott, Kari Bodine, Miranda Bernhardt (Lab Coordinator), Sowmya Anjur, Kristen Perkins (Curriculum Coordinator), Nadia Reynolds (Fellowship Coordinator); not pictured: Qurrat Waheed. Photo by Eugene Galdones.

By Nadia Reynolds – The Oncofertility Summer Research Fellowship (OSRF), a program that brings science teachers and college undergraduates into the Woodruff Lab, was initiated in 2009 with the support of a two-year American Recovery & Reinvestment Act grant.  For the past three years, high school biology teachers and Oncofertility Saturday Academy (OSA) alumnae have been hired to work in the Woodruff Lab over the summer, through the OSRF program.  Two teachers and two OSA alumnae participated in 2009, and five teachers and three OSA alumnae participated in 2010.

This year, OSRF was supported by the main Oncofertility Consortium grant, and four teachers were selected to participate in the program.  The teacher fellows included: Sowmya Anjur, a veteran teacher for Illinois Math & Science Academy, Qurrat Waheed, a new teacher at Westinghouse College Prep, and Kari Bodine and Amy Elliott, both teachers at Lakes Community High School.  The teacher fellows learned about the science behind fertility preservation, the bioethical issues surrounding the field of oncofertility, and participated in the development of new high school science lab modules called the Northwestern University Biology Investigations in Oncofertility, or NUBIO.

NUBIO includes a set of labs that were developed via a collaboration between local high school teachers and researchers in the Woodruff Lab in an attempt to teach students basic biology skills and advanced biotechnology techniques through the context of cancer, reproductive science, and oncofertility.  The teacher fellows expanded upon the already developed NUBIO labs as individual summer projects, which included new units on cancer, bioethics, and patient case studies.

OSRF was a huge success this year, and we wish all of our teacher fellows the best as they return to their schools in the fall to pilot NUBIO!  And next week we welcome the OSA alumnae student fellows into the lab!

Back in February, we blogged about one of our sister programs for the Oncofertility Saturday Academy (OSA) called, the Pennsylvania Academy for Reproductive Sciences otherwise known as the PARS program. Similar to OSA, the PARS program was started to teach high school girls about the research, clinical care and bioethics of fertility and cancer.  The PARS program was so successful that one of their former students, Emtithal Mahmoud, won the Pennsylvania state-wide science fair for her oncofertility research.  We contacted Emtithal (Emi) to learn more about her experience with the PARS program and below is what she had to say:

Q: Why did you initially apply to participate in PARS?

A: I have been interested in biology and all things related since seventh grade. I just love learning about life and its many mechanisms. Also, since I want to become an MD/PhD, I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to broaden my knowledge. After all, you can only learn so much in school.

Q: What did you learn from PARS? Do you think it’s a good opportunity for young women? Why?

A: I learned the fundamentals of the female reproductive system. Additionally, I was introduced to some pressing modern issues and learned how the material PARS covered could be applied to solve them. Lastly, I got a glimpse of the teamwork it takes to move the field forward. I think this is a wonderful opportunity for young women because the experience it provides is useful both academically and in every day life.

Q: Why did you decide to do a research project with us?

A: The experience I had with PARS was so wonderful that I found myself completely fascinated by the topic of reproduction. I decided to continue working with PARS in the hopes of prolonging the experience by using what I learned along with new information to go more in depth.

Q:  How did you decide on your research topic? How did you conduct the research? What did you find?

A: After learning about oncofertility at PARS and the negative effect of chemo on fertility, I really wanted to know more so I spoke with several PARS professors and some more research. I decided to research the effects of environmentally relevant doses of arsenic on the early stages of the reproductive system (follicular development, oocyte maturation, and early embryo development to the blastocyst stage). I conducted my research by doing an invitro study using a mouse model. I found that exposure at the levels I tested severely compromise follicular development and the nuclear competency of the oocyte. I also found that these doses arrest embryonic development to the blastocyst stage in a dose response fashion.

Q:  What happened with the science fair? What were your results?

A: I won second place in the local fair and first place in the regional fair.

Q: Did you feel adequately prepared to compete in the science fair based on your research efforts with our team?

A: Definitely!

Q:  What advice would you give to young women looking to become involved in science either in college or as a career?

A: Begin by seeking opportunities like these to broaden your knowledge and explore the different career options. If you are interested, learn more by asking professionals to clarify anything you don’t understand. Also, doing a research project is a fantastic way to enhance your learning experience.

It’s important to note that the success of the Oncofertility Academy is due in large part to the amazing teachers who work with these young women. One teacher in particular, Ericka Senegar-Mitchell, PhD runs an Oncofertility Academy called Be Wise in San Diego in affliation with UCSD. Among her many accomplishments, Dr. Senegar-Mitchell was recently named as a finalist for the California Teacher of the Year. We’re so proud to have such a prolific group of people committed to the field of oncofertility!