Sarah Iv
Health Professions Education Specialist
Description of work within DEI – As a Health Professions Education Specialist, I support and coordinate professional education programs and diversity program initiatives. I am responsible for coordinating logistical needs for I-DARE (Inclusion, Diversity, Anti-Racism, and Equity), an initiative to recruit diversity task forces across the UC Davis Health system. Additionally, I help support SEED (Supporting Educational Excellence in Diversity) training. I transitioned from being the Prep Médico program coordinator to the Public Education Specialist in January 2020. As a previous Prep Médico program coordinator, I assisted with event planning and outreach efforts for students interested in the medical field, as well as creating content for Prep Médico’s social media platforms. In addition, I was responsible for maintaining online technology support for the office’s educational programs and workshops, such as for the Growing as a Community series and Racial Healing Circles.
I graduated from UC Davis in 2018 and was previously a Health Career Connections intern working for the Center for a Diverse Healthcare Workforce here at UCDH before transitioning to the Office for Health Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in December 2019. I have presented nationally at the American Public Health Association about the need for Medicaid primary care providers for Southeast Asian communities in the San Joaquin Valley. My current academic goal is to pursue a Masters in Public Health in community sciences.
When not working, I am usually reading, journaling, playing with my cat or endlessly scrolling through memes on Instagram and Twitter.
Why I do DEI work – My parents are refugees from Cambodia, having fled the violence and genocide from the Khmer Rouge and the Vietnam War in the 1970s. My parents settled in Stockton, CA where I lived until I attended college at UC Davis. We were a low-income family, dependent on Medi-Cal, food stamps, and other government aid. While I exceled in school, the barriers I faced as a daughter of refugees was a daily struggle and even more so by the disconnect I felt with my parents’ language and culture. The trauma that exists in the Southeast Asian community today, as many refugee and immigrant families understand, continues to be a barrier. My work in DEI is both personal and professional as I hope to include my experiences and perspectives in ways that can positively shape others’ experiences. I view DEI work as a way to undo the harmful structures that have people, like my parents, have faced and me being here as a testament to our resilience.
Personal hashtag or motto - #health4all