Sarah Mojarad

I’m the owner and founder of Mitra LA, a Los Angeles-based small business in the retail luxury goods industry. Within its first year of operation, Mitra LA has sold over 5,500 items and generated over $700,000 in sales.

As a lecturer, my main responsibility was to educate students and help them build their communication skills. I worked primarily with students in engineering, science, and medicine disciplines. During the academic year, I taugh two, full-semester length university courses, Advanced Writing for Engineers and Social Media for Scientists & Engineers. I also co-taught a short course for students in the USC-Caltech MD-PhD program, Elements of Career Development for Physician Scientists. Currently, I provided regional misinformation and disinformation workshops via Zoom through the USC Election Cybersecurity Initiative. I frequently conducted workshops, seminars, and keynote lectures at universities and conferences around the world. In addition to teaching, I conducted qualitative research on social media. I also served on committees at USC and for outside organizations. Most recently, I was on the organizing committee for the US Kavli Frontiers in Science Symposium. For fun, I enjoyed writing blogs, tweeting, and creating YouTube videos on topics of interest including misinformation, disinformation, science communication, personal branding, and online harassment.

From 2017 – 2020, I held a joint-faculty appointment with Keck School of Medicine. During that time, I piloted a new communication and online professionalism program in medical education. The following is a brief summary on each component of the program: eProfessionalism for the Modern Medical Student (3-hour workshop, 18 students per session): This workshop was conducted in small group settings to first- and second-year medical students. Original case studies were used as teaching tools for the following topics: online professionalism, personal branding, and public trust in physicians eProfessionalism for the Modern Physician (1-hour interactive lecture, ~190 students): This session was a mix of lecture and active learning exercises. Students explored “gray area” themes for social media use involving personal and professional identities, the patient perspective, and rights to privacy on social media. Special topics: These modules were developed for online learning environments. Topics proposed: Increasing the Public’s Understanding of Medicine and Science via Wikipedia, Social Media Branding, and Digital Science Communication.

From 2016 – 2017, I was hired as a social media consultant for the Catalysis Center for Energy Innovation at the University of Delaware. This position was created thanks to a supplemental grant funded by the Department of Energy. In this role, I developed a unique social media strategy for the Principal Investigator’s social media accounts. I also advised the program manager on social media strategy for the Center. We developed a communication plan and I trained her on how to effectively use social media for science communication and outreach goals. At the end of my contractual agreement, I conducted a half day workshop at the University of Delaware. All of the teaching materials and evaluations were original and made specifically for the research scientists at the Center. I created a take home workbook for each attendee and utilized innovative teaching strategies, such as a flipped classroom approach, to keep students engaged for the duration of the session (4 hours). I conducted pre- and post- session assessments to measure success and learning outcomes. The findings were summarized in a final report that included recommendations for the Center’s communication strategy.

I was a Lecturer in the Division of Chemistry & Chemical Engineering at Caltech. During this time, I co- created and taught the course, Social Media for Scientists, to undergraduate and graduate students in science and engineering disciplines. This course is believed to be the first of its kind. It educated students on the issues and opportunities with using social media to communicate science.

Julia A. Kornfield laboratory

While at PETROL Advertising, I was an Insights Coordinator for one client, Western Digital (WD). I established KPIs, collected website and social media data, and interpreted findings into weekly and monthly reports for an exciting, new WD lifestyle brand – WD Ventito. I provided recommendations on how to build strategic social media campaigns and increase website traffic. Effective communication was necessary to succeed in this role. The project required extensive cross-departmental collaboration and weekly client-facing calls and meetings.

Concentration in Social Media and Online Communities