Pooja Chandrashekar

I participated in Mathcounts and Math Olympiad during my time at Nysmith! I loved the broad range of activities that were available to students, and the different paths I could take to explore my passions. I definitely tried out a bunch of after-school clubs, but was quickly drawn to the problem-solving and community fostered by the competition math clubs. But as for what I liked at Nysmith, one of the biggest strengths of Nysmith is the work ethic and writing skills that students cultivate throughout their time at the school. Also, my passion for computer science started at Nysmith in Mr. Fremlin’s classes. It was only because of Nysmith’s mandatory computer science classes that I had a strong foundation in CS as a freshman in high school.

After Nysmith, I graduated from TJ in 2015, and am currently a senior at Harvard University studying biomedical engineering and health policy. Nysmith sparked a love for computer science and technology, and gave me the skillset to jump headfirst into these fields in high school. At TJ, I explored artificial intelligence, parallel computing, and mobile app development, furthering my love for computing. But what solidified my decision to pursue technology in the long-term were my three summers spent interning at the MITRE Corporation in McLean. At MITRE, I spent three summers in the Nanosystems and Emerging Technologies Group working on developing a better way to diagnose concussions. I used machine learning and motor tracking to build software that is now in clinical trials at the National Rehabilitation Hospital. I realized that I wanted to use technology to address gaps in medical diagnosis and treatment, reduce healthcare disparities, and improve healthcare delivery systems.

In college, I’ve continued to build on my passions for digital health and healthcare technology by working on projects at Boston Children’s Hospital (BCH) to identify healthcare trends and patterns from social media data and leading projects at Harvard Medical School to analyze how technology contributes to the vision of value-based care. As for my summers, I’ve spent one at BCH working closely with a surgeon at their Vascular Anomalies Center developing a way to identify patients with high-risk vascular anomalies early on in their disease progression. And I spent my last summer working at the National Health Service (NHS) in London. The NHS is the UK’s universal healthcare system, and I had the privilege of working in their Strategy Group on the Test Beds project, an incredibly exciting national digital health rollout within the NHS.

Additionally, in college I’ve begun to hone my ability to take an idea and turn it into a tangible product/project that can impact people. For example, my team and I are working on building SpecrumVR, a virtual reality (VR)-based intervention to help autistic adolescents improve their social and interpersonal skills. We received funding from Harvard Business School and MassChallenge to take the project forward. I’m also working on building Planetary Health Watch, a real-time environmental hazard detection system that mines social media data and online news reports to identify environmental crisis signals and report them to local and state environmental agencies. My team and I won Harvard’s top entrepreneurship competition (Harvard College i3 Innovation Competition) and are using the funding to further our research for the product.

Together, these experiences have solidified my motivation to pursue a career in using technology to transform healthcare delivery and population health. And my experience volunteering in clinical settings (I run a volunteering program at Boston Children’s Hospital to help connect the families of autistic children to social services) has confirmed my desire to pursue digital health alongside clinical care. So I’m applying to medical school in the upcoming cycle (for matriculation in fall 2019) and hope to eventually pursue an MD/MBA.

It was crazy and unexpected! I feel so fortunate to have been admitted to these schools (all of which are wonderful), and can only thank my parents, teachers, and mentors for all the support along the way.

Seven years ago, on my first day of high school, I looked around my computer science class to realize I was one of just three girls in a class of thirty students. I felt discouraged and out of place, especially due to the negative “bro-grammer” stereotype and the lack of female role models. To address these glaring gender disparities, I founded ProjectCSGIRLS (www.projectcsgirls.com) five years ago as a high school sophomore. As a now-international nonprofit reaching 7,000 girls annually in forty states and nine countries, we fuse technical education with social change to build supportive peer networks of middle school girls developing technologies for social impact. I have built a team of 48 high school and college women who work with me to run nonprofit operations, secured partnerships with women in tech organizations, and raised over $200,000 in corporate sponsorship. In addition to running computer science outreach programs for middle school girls, we advocate for education reform as part of President Obama’s CSforAll initiative. I am driven to fight for gender parity in technology because of the incredible stories I see blossom as a result of ProjectCSGIRLS. These stories emphasize the value of innovative education models in breaking glass ceilings. I have furthered my passion for education equity by serving on the board for She Rocks the World, a teenage girls’ empowerment nonprofit, and by founding the Action and Civic Tech Scholars Program, a program run with the Boston Mayor’s Office to teach civic technology to low-income and minority high school students in Boston.

I’ve had the honor of being able to use these platforms to voice my opinions, shed light on the problems surrounding diversity in technology, and advocate for reform in both academic and corporate settings. I primarily speak about how young people can drive change, concrete strategies for improving diversity in technology classes and companies, and what it will take to close the tech gender gap. Public speaking has become one of my biggest passions, and Nysmith definitely helped me hone my ability to speak in front of a crowd!

Nysmith taught me so much about work ethic, dedication, and going out of your comfort zone. I came to Nysmith in 4th grade from my local public school, so it was a very different environment. The classes were much more challenging, the students were much more focused on academics, and it was a very different environment in general. But, it afforded me so much room to grow and learn; I discovered a love for writing, found my niche in math, and built such strong friendships with my peers. Nysmith taught me how to work hard and dream big, be creative (science fairs and art classes!), and apply my talents to help others and solve real problems.

Nysmith is a place that will challenge and nurture you; through the plethora of opportunities (both academic and non-academic), students, and teachers at Nysmith, you will discover your talents and cultivate your passions. In a single year, you will have the chance to visit a coal mine in Pennsylvania, build windmills for a science fair project, and engage in water balloon fights on field day. You will find friends for life, make memories that you will take with you to high school and beyond, and learn more than you ever thought possible.

Enjoy the experience, cherish your friends, and explore your interests!