REGISTRATION INFORMATION

Be Bold: Gender and Professional Risk-Taking

The focus of EMPOWER 2025 will be on gender and risk-taking. Hear from current leaders about their experience with risk and reward in their professional roles, and reflect on your own risk-taking skills!

To register for the conference, please fill out this REGISTRATION FORM. A waitlist will be created and registrants will be informed about their participation in the program as the date approaches. 

INFORMATION FOR PARTICIPANTS

Directions & Campus Map

Parking
Attendees should park in the *South Garage for patients & visitors on South Road located across from the Benedict Bldg.  There is a $8.00/day charge.

Location

The Summit will take place in the Faculty Conference Room in the medical school building from 8am to 5pm.

 

Directions to the Faculty Conference Room: Walk to the head of the quad towards the *Medical School Building.  If you are not an employee and do not have swipe access to the building, you will need to check-in at the front desk. The Faculty Conference Room is located on the right as you pass through security.

 

Continuing Medical Education Information (2025 CME information coming soon)
CME Accreditation/Designation Statement
The University of Massachusetts Medical School is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

The University of Massachusetts Medical School designates this live activity for a maximum of 6.5 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™. Physicians should claim only credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

Nursing: This live activity meets the requirements for up to 7.8 contact hours, as specified by the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Nursing (244-CMR 5.04).

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EMPOWER Summit Speakers

Melissa J. Moore, PhD
Professor Emerita, RNA Therapeutics
UMass Chan Medical School

Melissa J. Moore is a distinguished professor and industry executive. She ran a research lab funded by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and National Institutes of Health focused on post-transcriptional regulation of mammalian gene expression for 23 years at Brandeis University and the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School before joining Moderna to serve as its chief science officer for almost seven years.

Moore is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, winner of the 2011 ASBMB William C. Rose Award and winner of the 2021 RNA Society Lifetime Achievement Award.

She sits on the boards of several biotech companies, including Tessera Therapeutics, nChroma Bio and Via Scientific, and serves in multiple consulting roles.

Moore earned her Ph.D. in biological chemistry and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Session Title: Persistence and Serendipity in Science: A Poker Analogy

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Poker Power’s team of expert women poker instructors share a passion for using poker as a powerful tool for building confidence and taking ownership of one’s seat – whether at the poker table or in the board room.

About Poker Power:
Founded in 2020, Poker Power is a woman-led company that aims to empower women with confidence and risk-taking skills by teaching them to play poker. Learning how to think, strategize, negotiate and take risks, like a winning poker player, translates to leadership skills that help women succeed from the classroom to the board room. Through leadership development workshops, a proprietary poker app, and virtual lessons, Poker Power brings game changing skills to hundreds of organizations and has introduced tens of thousands of girls and women to the game. Want to learn more about Poker Power? Check us out in CBS, TIME, WSJ, Business Insider, Forbes, Bloomberg.

Session Title: Poker Power - Interactive Gameplay

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Mary Ahn, MD 
Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs
Professor, Psychiatry and Pediatrics

Mary Ahn, M.D. is Professor of Psychiatry and Pediatrics and Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs at the UMass Chan Medical School (School of Medicine, Morningside Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences and Tan Chingfen Graduate School of Nursing) since May 2021.  She oversees all aspects of faculty administration, including faculty appointments, promotion, tenure and post-tenure review; professional development for faculty; and oversight of the Office of Faculty Affairs.  Given the institutional commitment to enhancing the diversity and inclusion, Dr. Ahn partners with leaders in all academic departments, in the three schools and with teams across the organization including diversity and inclusion, human resources, student life and health equity...read more here
 
Session Title: Gender Equity at UMass Chan - A Snapshot

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Tiffany Moore Simas, MD, MPH, MEd, FACOG
Founder, EMPOWER Leadership Summit
Chair and Professor, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology

Dr. Moore Simas is the Donna M. and Robert J. Manning Chair of the Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology, and Professor of Ob/Gyn, Pediatrics, Psychiatry and Population & Quantitative Health Sciences at UMass Chan Medical School/UMassMemorial Health. 

Dr. Moore Simas is an academic specialist in general Ob/Gyn, physician-scientist, educator, advocate, and leader.  She is the founding Obstetric Engagement Liaison of the Massachusetts Child Psychiatry Access Program (MCPAP) for Moms, a first in nation state-wide program that enhances the capacity of obstetric care clinicians to address perinatal mental health and substance use disorders. MCPAP for Moms has impacted national policy and is the model on which other programs have been developed, including those funded by Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). There currently exists 31 Perinatal Psychiatry Access Programs – 29 state or regional, and 2 national programs – developed through a variety of funding mechanisms.....read more here.
 
Session Title: Summary Remarks & Wrap-Up

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Leadership Panel

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Jeannette Wolfe, MD 
Joy McCann Professor 
Professor of Emergency Medicine 
UMass Chan- Baystate

Session Title: Program Announcement – Women’s Professional Pods Program