LEAPS Speaker Series

School of Dentistry

Glenn Canares, DDS, MSD, is a pediatric dentist, an educator, and an aspiring professional speaker. His personal mission as UMB faculty is to inspire students, patients, and colleagues to become the best versions of themselves. He is intentional about creating a supportive environment of trust and leads with kindness.

Dr. Canares is an American-born child of Filipino immigrants and was raised in a blue-collar community. Through his upbringing, he learned that no dream is too big to go after, but also that no work is ever beneath him. He values authenticity and empowerment, viewing the world through a lens of realistic optimism. 
 
Dr. Canares’ educational philosophy is summed up by Maya Angelou: “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”

School of Pharmacy

Dr. Riley serves as an instructor and MS internship coordinator in the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences. He earned his PhD in bioinspired materials engineering from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County and completed his postdoc with the APHL-CDC Ronald H. Laessig Newborn Screening Fellowship. His research interests include development of machine learning algorithms focused on predictive models for drug discovery/delivery and microelectronic control of drug delivery using biocompatible platforms.

School of Nursing

Over the last few decades, Dr. Colloca has conducted studies on the behavioral, neural, and pharmacological mechanisms of pain modulation related to placebo and nocebo effects. Her lab has also developed an interest in virtual reality as a non-pharmacological approach to relieve pain and other symptoms. She has published in top-ranked international journals including Biological Psychiatry, Pain, Nature Neuroscience, JAMA, Lancet Neurology, Science and NEJM. As a result, Dr. Colloca has developed an international reputation as a leading scientist in advancing knowledge of the neurobiological mechanisms of descending pain modulation and placebo and nocebo effects with an integrative approach that includes psychopharmacological, neurobiological, and behavioral approaches.

School of Dentistry

Dr. Dhar is a board-certified pediatric dentist who serves on the councils on Scientific Affairs and Post-Doctoral Education at the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry (AAPD) and the Council of Scientific Affairs of the American Dental Association (ADA). He also serves on the ADA guideline panels on restorative care and caries prevention and has served on the pit and fissure sealants panel. He is on the AAPD guideline panel on vital pulp therapies in primary and immature permanent teeth and behavior guidance and has served on the AAPD panel to produce clinical practice guidelines on non-vital pulp and vital pulp therapies in primary teeth. He received the 2018 ADA Evidence Based Dentistry Mid-Career Faculty Award and the 2017 AAPD Jerome B. Miller/Crest-Oral-B/For The Kids Award. He also co-authored manuscripts that received the AAPD Paul Taylor Award in 2016, 2017, and 2020. Dr. Dhar has been involved in multiple research projects and has directed thesis work for master's degree candidates as an advisor or co-advisor.

School of Graduate Studies

Dr. Memiah holds the position of Professor at the University of Maryland and serves as the director for both the Implementation and Dissemination Science program and the Global Monitoring and Evaluation program at the Graduate School. Additionally, he is a fellow in the HIV Intervention Science Training Program (HISTP), supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This program aims to nurture and advance scientists engaged in technology-driven research related to HIV dissemination and implementation.

Dr. Memiah has an extensive body of work, with over 100 publications in peer-reviewed journals. He is an accomplished epidemiologist and enjoys international recognition for his expertise in continuous quality improvement. He has worked closely with various national organizations to develop and implement quality improvement (QI) programs, focusing on achieving the best possible outcomes for clients.

Furthermore, Dr. Memiah has taken on leadership roles in planning evaluations for various non-profit, private, and public agencies in a consulting capacity. These include evaluations for entities such as UNICEF (focused on Adolescent and Youth HIV/Sexual Reproductive Health), the Norwegian Lutheran Mission (centered on a health care capacity building project to enhance public health services), the Kenya Ministry of Health (related to the Elimination of Mother to Child Transmission or eMTCT), and the United Nations Trust Fund (on Gender-Based violence).

In his career, he has played a key role in shaping country guidelines, including his contribution to developing the Lesotho Strategic Plan for 2023-2027 and, most recently, the Eswatini National Strategic Framework. Dr. Memiah has also contributed significantly to formulating health policies in various countries. He has acted as the Principal Investigator for several grants that address critical issues in adolescent health and the health workforce and explores the convergence of adolescent health, digital solutions, HIV, and non-communicable diseases globally.

School of Nursing

Dr. Veronica P.S. Njie-Carr is a professor and academic nurse researcher in the School of Nursing at the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMSON) (https://www.nursing.umaryland.edu/directory/veronica-njie-carr/ ). She is a clinical nurse specialist with 40 years of professional nursing experience. She received her nursing diploma from The Gambia College in Gambia, a baccalaureate degree in nursing from Howard University, and a master’s and PhD in nursing from The Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. She joined UMSON in August 2013 and teaches graduate-level courses. Relevant to this discussion, Dr. Njie-Carr is a member of the Appointment, Promotion, and Tenure Committee.  Prior to this and for over 28 years, she taught nursing at different universities and colleges in the Baltimore-Washington Metropolitan area including Howard University and Johns Hopkins University.  

Dr. Njie-Carr’s program of research and scholarship are in the areas of global health, and the intersection of intimate partner violence and HIV among women of African descent.  She is committed to finding solutions to contribute to health equity nationally and globally.  She has worked on multiple research projects with interdisciplinary teams including her global work in developing countries. Nationally, she has worked on 1) leveraging technology to address the needs of aging women with HIV infection, and 2) investigating the experiences of immigrant and refugee women survivors of intimate partner violence. Dr. Njie-Carr’s global work focuses on developing expertise and leadership capacity for research scholars and health professionals with a 5-year grant funding from the Fogarty International Center at the National Institutes of Health.

School of Graduate Studies

Michelle Pearce is a professor at the University of Maryland Graduate School and a faculty liaison with the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning. She directs the Integrative Health and Wellness graduate certificate program.

In addition, she is a clinical psychologist who studies the relationship between religion/spirituality, coping, and health, as well as the integration of spirituality into the practice of psychotherapy. Her current research is on spiritually integrated cognitive processing therapy for moral injury and PTSD, as well as the development and evaluation of spiritual competency training for mental health professionals.

She received her PhD from Yale University and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy at Duke University Medical Center and a second fellowship in Spirituality and Health at the Duke Center for Spirituality, Theology, and Health. She is the author of the books “Night Bloomers: 12 Principles for Thriving in Adversity” and “Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Christians with Depression: A Practical, Tool-Based Primer” as well as the co-author of “Religion and Recovery from PTSD.”

School of Medicine

Dr. Viscardi is a neonatologist who  is a Professor of Pediatrics with a joint appointment in Medicine at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. Her research focus and current funding incorporates basic, translational, and clinical research investigations of the role of the genital mycoplasmas Ureaplasma parvum and U. urealyticum in neonatal diseases. She has been the PI on multiple NIH grants that have provided insights into the host immune factors in these infections and she is the investigator-sponsor of an IND to assess the pharmacokinetics, safety, and efficacy of azithromycin to treat Ureaplasma infections in preterm infants.

She is also the multiple PI of the Administrative Coordinating Center for the NHLBI Progenitor Cell Translational Consortium. She is a successful mentor with a 30-year track record of mentoring high school, college, and medical students, as well as pediatric residents, neonatology fellows and junior faculty. In recognition of her mentoring skills, she was appointed in 2015 as Director of the Joint Departmental Junior Faculty Academic Career Development and Mentoring Program for the Departments of Pediatrics and Medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.