Sophia Maino Sato

Community-Academic Scholar: Sophia Maino Sato (she/her)

Project: As a Community-Academic Scholar Sophia worked with Professor Chung-Yi Chiu and Illinois Joining Forces to examine the barriers to healthcare utilization that rural veterans may encounter while searching for and accessing needed services. Learn more about the project.

Mentor reflection: "Sophia was a delight to work with during this summer program. She had an excellent understanding of the goals of the project and the audiences we attempted to reach, and she was flexible and creative about how best to reach these diverse audiences. She was good humored about problems or challenges that came up and understanding about the limited bandwidth her community partner had to devote to this effort," said Jim Dolan, Senior Director of Development with Illinois Joining Forces. Being able to work in collaboration with diverse organizations who operate differently, have varying goals, objectives, and priorities, will be of benefit to Sophia as she continues her studies and begins to pursue her career.

Student reflection: “This program was especially meaningful as I had no prior experience on a research team, but I was given a chance. Not only was it immersive, but I was able to be involved in a community that I identify with.”