Principal Investigator: Dr. Vinita Hajeri

About Dr. Hajeri:

Dr. Vinita Hajeri is an Assistant Professor of Instruction with the Department of Science and Math Education at the University of Texas at Dallas. Dr. Hajeri earned her Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from The University of North Texas, Denton. Her graduate work focused on understanding the genetic and cellular responses to oxygen deprivation in the model organisms Caenorhabditis elegans. She pursued her postdoctoral training at UT Southwestern Medical Center where she used zebrafish as a model to study germ cell tumors. During her postdoctoral training, Dr. Hajeri also led several outreach activities where she advocated the use of model organisms (fruit flies, nematodes, flatworms, and zebrafish) in K-12 education to engage and inspire young learners about careers in life sciences. As a faculty member of the Department of Science and Math Education, Dr. Hajeri is heavily invested in utilizing model organisms to drive scientific inquiry in the K-12 and higher education classrooms so that students have opportunities to engage in scientific practices used by real-world scientists to make sense of life around them. To accomplish this, Dr. Hajeri has designed undergraduate and graduate courses at UT Dallas that engage pre-service, teacher’s in-service, and pre-medical students in inquiry-based learning. Dr. Hajeri also actively collaborates with the STARS (Science Teacher Access to Resources at Southwestern) program at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center to provide professional development to teachers’ in-service (grades 6-12).