PEBT

BEAM Team

Director

Joanna Christodoulou, EdD
Director

Telephone: (617) 643-1482
Email: jchristodoulou@mghihp.edu

Dr. Christodoulou is Assistant Professor at MGH Institute of Health Professions, as well as Research Associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Adjunct Lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Her research is situated at the intersection of education and neuroscience, and aims to use behavioral and brain data to improve student outcomes and optimize educational interventions for struggling learners. Learn more about Dr. Christodoulou.

Postdoctoral Researchers

Noor Al Dahhan, PhD
Postdoctoral Researcher

Noor Al Dahhan is a postdoctoral associate in the BEAM lab. She is fundamentally interested in examining the neural mechanisms that support neurocognitive development and how these mechanisms differ in individuals with various neurodevelopmental disorders, such as ADHD and dyslexia. Read more about Dr. Dahhan.

Anila D’Mello, PhD
Postdoctoral Researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Anila is a postdoctoral associate in the Gabrieli Lab at MIT. She is interested in exploring the neural underpinnings of language behaviors across neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism and dyslexia.

Rachel Romeo, PhD, CCC-SLP

Postdoctoral Researcher

Rachel is a postdoctoral fellow in Translational Neurodevelopment at Boston Children's Hospital and the Gabrieli Lab at MIT. Her research explores environmental factors contributing to children’s neural and cognitive development, specifically their language and reading acquisition.

Doctoral Researchers

Parnika Bhatia, MA-MBE
Doctoral Researcher

Parnika is a doctoral student at Le Centre national de la recherche scientifique, France.

Laura Mesite, EdD(c)

Doctoral Researcher

Laura Mesite is a Doctoral Candidate in Human Development and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She is interested in how sociocultural and cognitive factors affect language and reading development. She is specifically interested in how factors such as socioeconomic status and English language proficiency play a role in the identification and remediation of reading disabilities among children in the U.S.

Research Affiliates

Heather Beckius, MS '18, SLP-CF

Heather is a 2018 graduate of the MS in Speech-Language Pathology at the MGH Institute, and a speech-language pathologist at Boston Public Schools.

Allegra Le, MS '18

Allegra is a 2018 graduate of the MS in Speech-Language Pathology at the MGH Institute.

Neha Paranjpe, MS '18, SLP-CF

Neha is a 2018 graduate of the MS in Speech-Language Pathology at the MGH Institute.

Lili Uchida

Lili is an undergraduate Neuroscience major at Colorado College. She is interested in the relationships between the brain and human behavior, particularly in various neurological disorders.

Graduate Students

Claire Leong, BA
Graduate Assistant
MA-MBE Candidate at HGSE

Claire is a graduate student in the MA in Mind, Brain, and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Olivia Meegoda, BA
Graduate Assistant
Language and Literacy CAS Candidate

Olivia is a graduate student in the MS-SLP program at the MGH Institute and a candidate for the CAS Language and Literacy certificate. She is pursuing a thesis on reading fluency in populations with ADHD and Dyslexia and hopes to eventually work in the public school system as a speech-language pathologist and reading specialist.

Vanina Zack, BA
Graduate Assistant
MS-SLP Candidate

Vanina is a graduate student in the MS-SLP program at the MGH Institute.

Research Assistants

Andrea Imhof, BA
Research Assistant

Dayna Wilmot, BA
Technical Assistant

Dayna recently graduated from MIT after majoring in Brain and Cognitive Sciences. She is interested in the structural basis of learning disorders in children.

BEAM Team Alumni

Lauren Baron, PhD '18, CCC-SLP, MS

Lauren is a 2018 graduate of the PhD in Rehabilitation Sciences program at the MGH Institute. Lauren is now a postdoctoral research fellow and project coordinator in the South Carolina Research on Language and Literacy Lab at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, SC. She is working on two NIH-funded studies led by her mentor, Suzanne Adlof, PhD, that will investigate word learning and reading abilities in children with developmental language disorders from kindergarten through fourth grade. Tiffany Hogan is a Co-PI with Suzanne Adlof on one of the NIH studies.