During the 2019-2020 school year, UCI School of Humanities displayed a series of banners, each emblazoned with a particular virtue (or activity) and asking “What will the humanities cultivate in you?” I was honored to be featured in this campaign under “Empathy.”
I was also very excited to be featured on a large banner advertising the UCI Center for Medical Humanities, which was—appropriately enough—displayed on the bridge connecting the Medical School and the main UCI campus.
Finally, I was very honored to be featured in UCI Chancellor Howard Gillman’s June 2019 monthly email as an “interdisciplinary scholar of rare distinction.” From the original email:
“I am always impressed by students who pursue two or more courses of study widely separated across the academic landscape. This is not uncommon at the undergraduate level; each year we graduate several hundred students with dual degrees. But it is much rarer at the graduate level, where the depth of the subject matter requires intense concentration and focus, for a student to pursue degrees in disciplines with no common ground. Our Medical Scientist Training Program which lets students earn a joint M.D./Ph.D., is mostly for future physicians who want to also engage in biomedical research. But one MSTP student has a different idea. Sarah O’Dell, a second-year medical student, will this fall start working toward a Ph.D. in English. The first medical student at UCI to pursue a doctorate in the humanities, she believes her literature studies will make her a better and more responsive physician. She hopes someday to practice medicine, teach and write in a university setting. Congratulations, Sarah, on this unique and ambitious double doctorate program!”
