Kiana Heredia, a medical student in the Larner College of Medicine Class of 2024, helped Larner Assistant Professor of Pediatrics L.E. Faricy, M.D., create the URiM Pathway to Pediatrics program to assist others who may encounter the doubts she experienced during her undergraduate years. The program originated from a grant proposal Faricy and Heredia developed with help from Nicole Obongo ’24, Annaliese Lapides ‘24 and Mialovena Exume ’24, for American Academy of Pediatrics funding to support events aimed at increasing workforce diversity and supporting students historically underrepresented in medicine.
UPP program participants, faculty, and mentors pose for a group photo.
With the goal of one day becoming a physician, Kiana Heredia started her undergraduate degree at Mount Holyoke College as a pre-medical student. Faced with a course load of classes such as organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry, and physics, Heredia says she began to second-guess the gut feeling that she belonged in the medical field.
Now Heredia is a medical student in the University of Vermont’s Larner College of Medicine Class of 2024 and recently helped Larner Assistant Professor of Pediatrics L.E. Faricy, M.D., create the URiM Pathway to Pediatrics (UPP) program to assist others who may encounter the doubts she experienced during her undergraduate years...
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