Lavern Smith, a first-year dual-degree graduate student in the M.S. in Health Administration and M.S. in Health Informatics programs, has been awarded the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Foundation Scholarship. The $5,000 award is only given to one graduate student each year.
“Earning this scholarship means that I actually belong in this field – this recognition gave me so much joy and fuel needed to keep pushing through in the program,” said Smith. “During last semester, I struggled with managing the workload being a dual-degree student. I reached out to my Health Informatics professors, and they were so supportive, encouraging, and flexible.”
“Lavern is among the top of all students I have ever mentored,” said Sue Feldman RN, Ph.D., director of the UAB Graduate Programs in Healthcare Informatics. “Her passion is to improve the quality of and access to health care. She has a vision and I feel confident that she will surround herself with a team to execute that vision. She is definitely one of the ones who will make changes over the next decade.”
In addition to being a dual-degree graduate student, Smith serves as a teaching assistant in the B.S. in Health Care Management program and as a student worker for the Live HealthSmart Alabama program where she helps manage a national pilot program for culinary arts mentoring in high school. Live HealthSmart Alabama is part of the UAB Grand Challenge.
“As an intern at Kaiser Permanente, Lavern had the opportunity to develop a training simulation to help medical centers improve their compliance and quality scores – it was later scaled across five medical centers in Southern California,” said Amy Landry, Ph.D., Howard W. Houser Professor of Health Services Administration and director of the MSHA program. “She is a future leader who will shape health care and I’m excited she received this award.”
Prior to enrolling in graduate school, she was a service management analyst for Capgemini, a global company specializing in technology services and digital transformation. There she managed the ServiceNow Enhancements workstream supporting development, customer service and business continuity.
Before that, Smith was a Government and Public Services Consultant at Deloitte. While at Deloitte, she was selected as a D2international Fellow where she supported the Program Delivery & Partnerships team in Cambodia, which is focused on helping global NGOs amplify impact to the anti-human trafficking ecosystem and to the survivors of human trafficking in Cambodia. She designed and deployed a current state assessment survey, client exit survey strategy, and partnership strategy with multiple NGOs in Cambodia that included pairing organizations to fill identified gaps.
“The legacy I want to leave in health care is making an impact in my community,” said Smith. “I want to help repair the relationship between the black community and health care by being an advocate and leader that people of color can trust, ultimately resulting in improved health outcomes for the population.”
In addition to the scholarship award, Smith will also receive a trip to the HIMSS Global Health Conference and Exhibition.
