Visiting Scholars
Visiting Scholars, Winter 2021/2022
University of Pennsylvania
Visiting Scholars, Spring 2020
Cairo University
Visiting Scholars, Summer 2018
Einstein College of Medicine & Cardozo Law
Visiting Scholars, Fall 2016 – Summer 2017
Erin Hayde, a native Californian, completed her bachelor’s degree in Economics and Political Science, with a minor in Anthropology, at the University of Utah. She worked for the Utah Governor’s Environmental Advisor, Ted Wilson, as well as the Utah Office of Energy Development. Erin then served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Panama, where she worked on a variety of projects, from education development and reforestation projects to life planning and sexual health seminars. She has just completed an M.A. in Economics from The New School for Social Research. Erin’s academic interests include sustainable development, sexual and reproductive health, and public policy.
The New School
Michael S. Dauber is a philosopher, bioethicist, and writer with an MA in bioethics from the New York University College of Global Public Health and a BA in philosophy and journalism from Fordham University. He has served as a clinical ethicist and currently works as an institutional review board coordinator. His written work has appeared in STAT News, Becker’s Hospital Review, The Hastings Center’s Bioethics Forum, Ethics and Society (Fordham University), The Gittenstein Institute for Health Law and Policy’s Bioethics Blog (Hofstra University), and Dialogue. His work has focused on issues in medical, nursing, and research ethics, and the ethics of new technologies and personal identity. He has written and presented on the ethics of three-parent babies, germ-line modification, animal research, human head transplantation, and luxury medicine, the American Health Care Act, and the use of cognitive enhancements by physicians, as well as the ways in which developments in moral psychology and neuroscience determine morality and the value of artificially intelligent “life.” For more of his work, visit 
New York University
Visiting Scholars, Summer 2016
Rimah Jaber is currently working toward a Master’s degree in Ethics & Society at Fordham University focusing in bioethics. She received her BS from John Carroll University in 2015 in Biology with minors in Spanish and Women’s & Gender Studies. During her undergraduate career, she worked with organizations such as Middle Eastern Student Association and Cleveland Peace Action engaging in discourse and social action for human rights and international justice. Her interests include a range of ethical issues surrounding women’s health and advancements in biotechnology, as well as those issues aligning with human rights. Rimah plans on pursuing a Ph.D. in bioethics to ultimately work in research and clinical ethics.
Fordham University
Jorge Luis Rivera-Agosto, J.D. is a current student in the M.S. in Bioethics Program at Columbia University. He graduated from Inter American University School of Law in June, 2016 with a Juris Doctor and obtained a B.A. in Philosophy, magna cum laude, from the Pontifical Catholic University of Puerto Rico in June, 2013. He’s currently the Secretary for the Guaynabo Rotary Club and his interests include health care access to racial/ethnic minorities in the United States.
Columbia University
Bobby Thomas, M.S. completed the Bioethics Program at Union Graduate College and Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai earning a Master’s of Science degree in Bioethics Policy Specialization within one year. He graduated from Queens College, City University of New York in June 2014 with a B.A. in Neuroscience & Biology and a B.A. in English. As an undergraduate, he volunteered at local hospitals including North Shore LIJ and Winthrop University Hospital. He also worked at Newsday, a local newspaper company in Long Island. He is interested in public policy and bioethics.
Icahn School of Medicine
Visiting Scholars, Spring 2016
Université de Montpellier
New York University
Visiting Scholars, Spring 2015
New York University
Marc Beuttler graduated from Tulane University in 2012 with a degree in Spanish. He graduated form New York University, Bioethics Program with an M.A. degree in 2014. His interests are broad, including neuroethics, transhumanism,clinical and reproductive ethic. Marc will be starting medical school next fall at LSU New Orleans.
Icahn School of Medicine
Caroline Song is pursuing a degree in medicine and hopes to integrate her work in Bioethics to create sustainable and ethical models of healthcare in rural areas both abroad and within the United States. She also obtained an M.A. degree in Bioethics from New York University in 2014. Her interests were primarily focused on healthcare ethics with a heavy emphasis on the ethics of organ transplantation in disadvantaged populations. Her thesis pursued the question of what role efficacy, futility, and compliance can play in debating the transplantation of organs in cognitively impaired individuals. In the spring of 2014, Caroline was able to present her research in the academic Threesis competition hosted by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at New York University. She placed among the top twelve finalists. She graduated from Saint Louis University in 2011 with a degree in Biology and a minor in Theology.
New York University
Visiting Scholars, 2014
Josephine Adebukola Awosogba, M.A
Josephine Adebukola Awosogba studied Philosophy and Bioethics at the University of Virginia. She went on to complete an MA in Clinical and Environmental Ethics at New York University. During her graduate years, Bukky explored bioethical issues surrounding health law and research ethics which culminated in an internship at the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues in Washington, DC. In 2012, Bukky joined the Department of Immunology Allergy and Rheumatology Section of Clinical Sciences at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, MA. Knowledge of research ethics informed crucial aspects her work as a research associate including patient recruitment, trial maintenance, and study design. Bukky continues to work as a Clinical Research Associate in New York City as she prepares to pursue a PhD in Bioethics and Health policy in the coming year.
Tanya Naiken, M.A.
Tanya Naiken is a graduate of St. John’s University with an M.A. in International Relations and Government Administration. Tanya’s commitment to impoverished and underserved populations led her to work for the United Nations and associated NGO’s including, the US Fund for UNICEF and the United Nations Association of the US (UNA-USA), a program of the United Nations Foundation. Her current research interest include reproductive rights of women and girls in the Global South.
Andrew Rock, M.S. Candidate
Andrew Rock is a graduate student in Bioethics at Columbia University. As an undergraduate Philosophy major, his primary interests included analytic philosophy, logic and contemporary metaphysics. Further into his undergraduate studies he developed a strong interest in ethics, particularly topics of meta-ethics in relation to biomedical issues. He holds his B.A. from Boston University and has also pursued coursework in political science at Harvard University.
Abrigul Akbarshoevna, M.A., Ph.D. Candidate
Abrigul Lutfalieva Akbarshoevna received her Master in Bioethics from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. She was a pioneer student awarded the Fogarty International Center of the National Institutes of Health(NIH) scholarship from Tajikistan. Abrigul has conducted training on Bioethics in Central Asia at Tajik Academy of Sciences, Avicenna Tajik Medical University in Tajikistan and at Deutsch-Kasachische Universität of Kazakhstan. Moreover, she is serving as Editorial Assistant for the first e-journal on Bioethics in Tajikistan. Currently, Abrigul is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Political and Social Sciences at Freie Universität Berlin, analyzing the global issues of the sustainability of water supply and sanitation in rural areas.
Evangelia Lea Lazaris, M.S.
Evangelia Lazaris grew up in Los Angeles, CA. She is a graduate of Columbia University in New York with a MS in Narrative Medicine. She also holds a BS in Exercise Biology and a BA in French Literature and Language from UC Davis. During her undergraduate career, she studied French History and Literature at Université Bordeaux III. Her research experience includes DNA repair research usingSaccharomyces cerevisiae to determine the role of certain polymerases in Double Strand DNA Break Repair; approaches to drug design strategies using the yeast model system to mimic various pathogens that attach to cells via mannose and mannose receptors; chin and malar implants, fine line dermal fillers, liposuction machines, lidocaine use in European Dermal Fillers; and exercise stress tests and pulmonary function in children who had received lung irradiation. Her honors thesis, entitled Le Siècle des Lumières—La Revolution Scientifique et Philosophique focused on the integration of sciences and morality. Since her interests include theory of the human encounter as it relates to patient, physician and caregiving narratives, Evangelia designed and taught Narrative Medicine workshops for inner-city eighth graders connected medicine and the arts and introducing them to the world of medicine. She is fluent in Greek and French.