Leah Harmon (she/her) is a McDougal Graduate Teaching Fellow in Poorvu’s Center for Teaching and Learning and a Graduate Writing Partner at Poorvu’s Yale College Writing Center. As a McDougal Fellow, Leah helps to organize and teach pedagogical workshops that serve graduate students and postdocs. In the Yale College Writing Center, she meets with undergraduate clients on a weekly basis for academic work and on an as-needed basis for fellowship preparation. A PhD candidate in the Yale Interdepartmental Neuroscience Program, Leah is passionate about neuroscience education and is working to make science more accessible. She does this in part by helping her clients at the writing center earn STEM fellowships and admission into graduate programs, advocating for more equitable STEM classrooms while teaching pedagogical workshops, and through organizing outreach initiatives such as Yale’s Brain Education Day. She is inspired by the three generations of female educators above her: Mima, Nonna, and Mom.
Before Yale, Leah earned her Bachelor of Science, summa cum laude, from the University of Notre Dame, where she completed an honors thesis examining age-related changes in brain network connectivity and its relation to cardiovascular health. She also worked as teaching fellow for neuroscience lab courses, which she continues to do at Yale. Now, in Dr. Sreeganga Chandra’s lab, Leah studies the molecular and cellular underpinnings of Parkinson’s Disease, specifically at the synapse, using mouse models and patient-derived neurons.
Outside of work, Leah loves to do the daily crossword, read non-science books (when she has time), and try out New Haven restaurants. A New Englander born and raised, she feels most at peace skiing in the mountains or spending time on the ocean.