Career Pathways: Meet Letisha Wyatt, PhD, Assistant Professor, Neurology and Cancer Early Detection Advanced Research, Director of Diversity in Research, Research and Innovation Office at Oregon Health and Sciences University

What is your background and what brought you to Portland?

I am a neuroscientist and pharmacologist by training. I completed my Ph.D. at the University of Southern California in 2013 and relocated to Portland for a postdoc at the Legacy Research Institute. During both my time as a graduate student and a postdoc, there were a couple of recurring themes about my interests in addition to my research and that was why is it so dang hard to1. find mentors that I identify with and 2. do reproducible researchTo be honest, when I entered my postdoc, I had no intention of an academic career. Little did I realize then, that my interests in these other aspects of science would lead me to a faculty career at OHSU.

What influenced you to pursue a degree in science? Did you have any science role models?

I did not have any science role models. I didn’t realize that this was a career path that existed until midway through undergrad. And even then, I didn’t fully understand what a scientific career meant. I entered undergrad as a pre-med and quickly realized, while I really enjoyed learning about how the body worked, I was not interested in practicing medicine. My interest in science sparked after taking upper-division neuroscience courses and completing an intensive neurobiology/physiology/behavior course, lovingly called the “chicken lab”. I was at the University of California, Davis, an agricultural school.In the chicken lab, we had to catch our chicken, anesthetize it, and perform surgery on one of the assigned major systems. This lab was known to take several hours, after which we had to write a research paper on our methods and outcomes. My group studied aviary lung function and I remember spending lots of time with the lab TA as I worked on my research report. From that TA, I really came to understand what basic science research was and it was a pivotal moment for me when I decided that I wanted to use my degree to study the brain.By the time I completed my Ph.D., I realized the importance of mentors and, in particular, noticed the lack of student and faculty diversity in STEM. It wasn’t until becoming an assistant professor at OHSU did I finally truly receive the mentorship (thanks Dr. Fair and Dr. Westbrook!) that I needed all along and it’s my goal to pay it back.

Tell us about your current role and what led you to this position. Did you switch career paths at any point? 

After my postdoc, I joined OHSU as an assistant professor in the Library. My role as the Basic Science Liaison allowed me to stay connected to basic science research and act as an interpreter so-to-speak between the library and scientists with regards to resources and needs. I have had this long-standing frustration with how difficult it can be to efficiently do science and work openly and reproducibly. The scientific enterprise has a long way to go, but there are so many folks pushing us in the right direction and we have a lot to learn from Librarians! During my time in the OHSU Library, I was permitted to create supportive workshops for research methods that promoted best practices for data stewardship. It’s a funny thing, that part of scientific training is to learn as you go, usually from trial and error. But that can make the whole process inefficient, ineffective, and for the individual fairly unrewarding. The workshops that developed were to share what I learned as a senior graduate student and postdoc ideally to new graduate students in an effort to raise their awareness about how to manage long-term projects, take good care of their data, and feel less like they are wasting time. Now my work in this area has shifted a bit to help build infrastructure at the organizational level to enhance data retention and security. This is especially important when faculty and scientific specialists (beyond the training stage) are dedicating lots of time and money into producing loads and loads of data.Not long after joining OHSU, I began to take on roles in shaping how OHSU works to diversify and retain students from underrepresented backgrounds. Now I direct two training programs for post-baccalaureate and postdoctoral trainees of color and seek to improve the experiences that mentees have with their mentors (PIs).

What future goals do you have for your career?

My future career goals really revolve around having a long-term impact on racial equity in STEM graduate education.

Do you have any advice for women who are pursuing careers in science?

All women, but in particular women of color, need to find mentors that they can trust. Because there is such a lack of transparency in the scientific enterprise, it’s essential to find that confidante, champion (or several if possible) that can really guide, sponsor, and support you through the journey. Hit me up if you’re looking!

What are some challenges you faced along the way?

At every stage of my career in the academy, I’ve had experiences that point to being treated differently likely because of my identity as a woman and also a Black American: from shifting and subjective rules about graduate program expectations and what counts as successful achievement of milestones; lack of credit for my work – or someone else taking credit altogether; significant pay inequity; the dreaded diversity tax and being expected to do so much more than my majority peers; the list goes on and on. If you’ve heard about a gender-based inequity, I’ve lived it two-fold as a Black woman.

What is the impact you are making or would you would like to make in your field?

I really want to see more people with backgrounds and identities like me in the academy. I want to see multiple people with backgrounds and identities similar to mine represented in leadership or as decision-makers. I want folks from all walks of life to know that this space is for them. I want them to be in science and not feel like an “other”, “only”, or outsider. All this will take a complete restructuring of the enterprise of science and an acknowledgment of the inherent systemic racism baked in, and working to dismantle these systems is the impact that I hope to leave on the field.

What is a fun fact about you that not many people know?

I grew up in a very small ag town and had a Friday Night Lights kind of youth which included cheerleading and football games and parties in fields and barns! There was very little to my world outside of my hometown (hey, Turlock, Modesto, Ceres, Merced, Atwater folks). At the time there was only one high school in my town and I had no intentions to go to college (thought it was out of reach b/c of $) until my history teacher pushed me to apply…and here – still trying to explain to my family that I’m not that kind of doctor.