By Josh Deignan, PhD, FACMG (Committee Chair)
It is important for Pathology research alumni (former graduate students and postdoctoral fellows) to think of the department as a place that was personally meaningful and professionally beneficial in their lives. Too often, graduates lose touch with the department and the connections they had made there. Therefore, the purpose of the Research Alumni Committee is to help facilitate those social connections and also be a resource for career development, though activities such as online alumni career networks, invited alumni speakers, alumni career panels, and alumni profiles in the departmental newsletter.
In addition to existing online job databases, LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com) is an effective tool for providing alumni with career resources, and a Pathology Research Alumni group has already been created. This allows alumni to share job opportunities and post relevant information to the group.
A quarterly departmental newsletter is also being sent to all alumni via LinkedIn (and regular mail when available). We have included a section which lists all of the departmental publications for the quarter, in order to encourage the interest of the graduate students and postdoctoral fellows from the department and we have also included alumni spotlight articles highlighting personal and professional accomplishments from some of our former familiar faces. Other planned activities for the future include department-sponsored receptions at national meetings.
The hope is that through all of these types of activities, the alumni will continue to support the department and continue to support each other.
Joshua Deignan, PhD, FACMG, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine in the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. He is one of the Associate Directors of the UCLA Molecular Diagnostics Laboratories, specializing in the areas of molecular genetics and genomics. He performed his undergraduate work in Genetics at the University of California, Davis, and he received his Ph.D. in Pathology and completed his medical genetics fellowship training at UCLA. He is Board-certified by the American Board of Medical Genetics (Clinical Molecular Genetics) and is licensed by the state of California as a Clinical Genetic Molecular Biologist (CGMB).
For questions about upcoming alumni activities, please contact Josh Deignan, PhD (jdeignan@mednet.ucla.edu).
To make a donation to the Pathology graduate program or to any other departmental endeavor, information can be found in our Giving page.
