Our Boston program is a little different where we leverage the city of Boston and all of its resources. Classes are located at nearby universities such as MIT, Harvard, Simmons, or other elite locations. No matter the course, you’ll experience a buzzing campus filled with fellow bright, ambitious, energetic students.

See below for more information on the Summer Springboard instructors in Boston!

Business & Entrepreneurship

Dr. Michellana Jester, MIT

Michellana Jester is a Lecturer and GLab Course Manager at the MIT Sloan School of Management. She is responsible for leading the design and delivery of MIT Sloan’s largest project-based course, as well as supporting teams of student entrepreneurs around the world. Michellana has a master’s degree from Harvard University and a doctorate from Columbia University. 

Emergency Medicine

Dr. Enrique Valdespino, Doctors Without Borders

Most recently, Dr. Valdespino has been recruited by Doctors Without Borders to provide medical care where it is most needed, and is awaiting mission placement. Dr. Valdespino graduated from Harvard Medical School with a Master of Medical Sciences in Global Health Delivery. Prior to Harvard, Enrique worked as a physician with Compañeros en Salud México (CES), a sister organization of Partners in Health, after he completed his medical training. At CES he worked as a Regional Supervisor to support primary care physicians in charge of rural clinics in non-accessible areas. In this role, he addressed challenges in regards to medical care delivery, clinic management, and community relations.

Finance & Investing

Stephen Maloney, Northeastern University

Stephen Maloney has served in global executive roles in risk management at Moody’s Analytics, Willis Towers Watson, Accenture, Risk Capital LLC, and Pace Global Energy (a Siemens company) providing risk and financial technology and advisory services. His expertise encompasses insurance, banking, and commodity supply chain risk management. He is experienced in remote sensing and satellite imaging of supply chains, econophysics, thinly traded and illiquid assets, alternative investments, large project finance, catastrophe bonds, climate models and atmospheric physics, and carbon pricing. Mr. Maloney has an MS Applied Physics from The Johns Hopkins University, an MS Operations Research from Northeastern University, and BS Physics and BS Mathematics degrees from New York University’s Tandon School of Engineering. He also earned a Professional Engineer’s license, and served as a commissioned officer in the US Navy nuclear propulsion program where he qualified Chief Engineer.

Psychology & Neuroscience

Adam Morris, Harvard University

Adam Morris is a Ph.D. candidate and instructor in psychology at Harvard University. He received his B.S. in psychology from Brown University, where he graduated magna cum laude with honors. Adam specializes in social-emotional learning. Most of us spend decades of our life in school, and yet we are never taught the most meaningful thing: how to be with other people, in a healthy and fulfilling way. Adam seeks to understand the social-emotional skills that support a deep and nourishing social life, and to help people develop those skills. Adam has received numerous awards for his research and teaching, including the prestigious National Defense Science and Engineering Fellowship and the George W. Goethals Teaching Prize.

Trial Law

George Muksian, Wesleyan University

George Muksian combines a lifetime of courtroom experience with teaching experience at some of the nation’s top universities. He has worked as a criminal defense lawyer and prosecutor for many years, as well as having tried many cases in the Rhode Island and Massachusetts trial courts. George has also been a law lecturer at Tufts University, Johnson & Wales University and other universities. He holds degrees from Harvard University (Ed.M), Suffolk University (J.D.), Wesleyan University (M.A.), and Providence College (B.A.).

Fundamentals of Engineering

Dr. Joshua Ramos, MIT

Dr. Joshua Ramos is a Lecturer and Design Education Practitioner in the Mechanical Engineering department at MIT. As a design educator, he is at the intersection of engineering, education, and digital media. Through the use of active learning, he creates rich in-classroom learning experiences that utilize hands-on activities that give students a chance to practice and explore while they learn. Josh also supports authentic project-based learning for mechanical engineering students learning product design. In addition to hands-on educational experiences, his past research has explored the use of digital media, delivered through the Internet, to enhance both residential and remote hands-on learning environments. Josh received his SB, MS, and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at MIT.

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See below for more information on the Summer Springboard instructors in Los Angeles!

Biology & Medicine

Krista McCutcheon, M.Sc.

Krista has been working as a professional drug hunter in the San Francisco Bay area for over 20 years. She is a co-inventor on drug patents in diverse therapeutic areas, including inflammation, angiogenesis, cancer, immuno-oncology, and infectious disease. Her collaborative research in industry and academia has led to scientific publications of new biological insights into disease, drug mechanisms of action, and state-of-the-art methods and technologies. Krista holds an M.Sc. in Neuroscience and a B.Sc. in Biochemistry and Genetic Engineering. 

Business & Entrepreneurship

Dr. Laura Manyweather, Ed.D., MBA

Dr. Laura Manyweather is a college professor and consultant. Laura specializes in program, fund, and non-profit development. With 29 years of experience with private corporations and 12 years in academia, she brings systems, processes and organizational structure to small and micro businesses, in order for them to thrive in an ever-changing economic environment. In addition Dr. Laura Manyweather also shows positivity, inclusiveness, emotional intelligence and restorative leadership skills to organizations. Presently, she teaches business courses to emerging leaders and aspiring business owners. Dr. Manyweather’s teaching style and approach to Adult Learning is innovative and intuitive. Dr. Laura Manyweather received an award and was recognized as a Women of Influence (WOI) in 2018. She served as the President of the National Association of Professional Women (NAPW), Gardena Chapter (2009-2013).

Computer Science

Dr. Ramin Ramezani

Dr. Ramin Ramezani is an Adjunct Associate Professor of Computer Science and a Research Scientist at the Center for Smart Health, UCLA. He is also a Managing Technical Director at Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) within David Geffen School of Medicine. He was formerly the Chief Technologist in the Big Data and Analytical Unit within the Department of Surgery and Cancer at Imperial College London. His research is focused on employing various engineering techniques to tackle problems that arise in the medical domain, primarily, with focus on improving quality of care, personalized care and early disease detection.

Emergency Medicine

Violet Bagni

Violet Bagni is an EMT Clinical Instructor at UCLA where she teaches the fundamentals of emergency medicine; including the proper care and transportation of the sick and injured patients. Violet has 20 years of experience working in a fast-paced environment and educating her team members and nurses in emergency technical procedures, skill reviews, and up to date patient care treatment. Violet is also a member of the Henry Mayo Emergency Room Management Team.

Filmmaking

Matt Miller, BA

Matt is an adventure photographer and videographer from Tennessee, currently working in San Diego and LA. Matt’s story starts with his parents who encouraged him to see the world through the eyes of an artist and he quickly developed an intense appreciation of the visual arts. Matt is a motivated videographer and video editor with skills that include planning/storyboarding, directing, shooting, and bringing it all together with technical & motion graphic editing. He is highly trained in the CC Adobe Suite, with a focus on Premiere Pro, After Effects, Illustrator, and Photoshop.

Fundamentals of Engineering

Artin Davidian, MS

Artin Davidian is an engineering professor with over 15 years of teaching experience in the Greater Los Angeles area. With a focus on design, rehabilitation engineering, and project management, Artin has a passion for teaching engineering and technology courses to both college and high school students. He received his Bachelor’s and Master’s in Mechanical Engineering from California State University, Los Angeles.

Psychology & Neuroscience

Alysia Burbidge, Ph.D. Candidate

Alysia Burbidge is a Ph.D. candidate in social psychology at University of Southern California. Her research focuses on motivation, social class, and identity. She is currently looking at how we can use identity-based motivation to better understand and improve academic goal-setting and goal-attainment for minoritized and economically disenfranchised students. She is also examining how conceptual metaphors of social class and politics interplay in our perceptions of the socioeconomically disadvantaged. She uses a variety of approaches, include experimental methods, multilevel modeling, text analysis, and real-world intervention work, to examine these questions. Prior to USC, Alysia received her Psychology B.S. from the University of California, Riverside.

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See below for more information on the Summer Springboard instructors in UC San Diego!

Biotechnology

Vicki Nienaber-Meadows, Ph.D.

Dr. Nienaber has over 30 years’ experience at large companies, mid-sized biotech, and her own biotech, Zenobia Therapeutics. Throughout Dr. Nienaber’s career she has been both an early adopter as well as an inventor of instrumentation and technology directed towards early-stage drug discovery. She is best known as lead inventor of the crystallographic fragment-based lead discovery method that is still used worldwide to identify clinical candidates and marketed products. She was also the technical lead for invention of the first crystal mounting and alignment robot, ACTOR, which was recognized with an R & D top 100 innovations award. The robot is now sold commercially by Rigaku. Dr. Nienaber has overseen large multinational drug discovery programs, early-stage drug discovery pipelines and build platforms consisting of robotics, procedures, and relational databases and two companies. She has been awarded grants from the Michael J Fox Foundation, California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation.

Emergency Medicine

Dr. Benjamin Supat

Born on the Central Coast of California, Benjamin Supat completed his undergraduate degree at Stanford University and a Master of Public Health at Washington University in St. Louis. He completed medical school at UC San Diego and is now a senior resident in the UCSD Emergency Medicine Residency Program. One of the consistent joys of his career has been the opportunity to give back through teaching and mentorship. He has regularly engaged learners across the spectrum, from middle school students to junior residents in the emergency department. Outside of work, he enjoys spending time with his wonderful daughters and amazing wife.

Drone Cinematography

Brandon Murphy, MBA

This course was designed by Brandon Murphy. Brandon has worked with small businesses and Fortune 8 companies for over 13 years, bringing a wide range of expertise to RJ Films. He is responsible for setting the company-wide strategies and building our business, while overseeing the sales & marketing.

Psychology & Neuroscience

Karen Markowtiz, MA

Karen Markowitz has been a psychology instructor for over 20 years at various colleges and universities in the coastal San Diego area. She received both her Bachelor of Arts degree and her Master of Arts degree in psychology with an emphasis in the area of clinical psychology. She also has several years of experimental research conducted within the area of chemosensory perception (taste and smell) through the University of California San Diego. She takes great pleasure in working with adolescents and young adults as they begin the path to understanding the scientific study of human behavior and thought.

Fundamentals of Engineering

George Mansfield, MSME

George Mansfield loves both the practice and the teaching of engineering in equal measure. After receiving his bachelor’s degree from University of Detroit in 1956, he worked for 1 2 years designing engine control systems at three different companies, advancing from new-hire to Senior Staff Specialist at Solar Turbines in San Diego. In 1968, upon earning his MSME from San Diego State University, he accepted a full-time position there, ultimately retiring as a full professor in 1994. After returning to industry, Professor Mansfield returned to teach part time at SDSU in mostly project-based courses from 2002 to 2013. For the past 50+ years he has also maintained an active engineering consulting practice in diverse disciplines for many local companies.

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