Former Staff and Interns

Former Staff

Michelle Soledad

Clinical Research Coordinator
Michelle joined Seattle Children’s in January 2022 after working as a medical assistant at Virginia Mason Franciscan Health. She graduated with a BS in Biology and a minor in Chemistry from Seattle University in 2020. She hopes to become a physician associate and provide care to underserved communities. She is very excited to learn more about early development as well as meet and work with all our WONDER study families and babies.

Hope Willis

Clinical Research Coordinator
Hope joined Seattle Children’s in 2020, after graduating with a BS in Neuroscience from the University of Washington. She is interested in childhood brain development and hopes to pursue a graduate degree in a related field in the future. Hope’s favorite part of the WONDER study is interacting with our study families and seeing babies in EEG caps during visits.

Kate Riley

Clinical Research Coordinator II
Kate joined Seattle Children’s Innovative Technologies Lab (SCITL) in March 2020 to work on the WONDER study. Currently, she’s pursuing her Master’s in Clinical Mental Health Counseling at Seattle University. She’s interested in counseling families with children with neurodevelopmental disorders and exploring the benefits of spending time in nature on mental health.

Jessica Benton

Clinical Research Coordinator II
After working as a behavior specialist in a range of settings, Jessica went on to receive her MA in Child Applied Psychology from the University of Washington. Jessica joined Seattle Children’s as a therapist intern for the OCD Intensive Outpatient Program and now works for the Seattle Children’s Research Institute on several projects including the WONDER study for SCITL.

Former Interns

Katie Hegerberg

Katie is a junior at University of Washington majoring in Psychology and minoring in Data Science. She joined SCITL because she is interested in the cognitive development of children and hopes to pursue a career in pediatric psychology. Outside the lab, Katie enjoys reading, exploring the Pacific Northwest, and playing with the Husky Marching Band.

Morgan Bowles

Morgan is a junior at the University of Washington working towards graduation in the class of 2023 with a BS in psychology and a minor in English: Writing. Morgan is currently on the gymnastics team at UW and enjoys competing for the school as well as creating relationships with teammates and younger fans. Post-college, Morgan plans on getting a PhD in general Psychology in hopes of becoming a hospital Psychologist. Working with the Seattle research institute is important to Morgan because it is one of the first stepping stones in her career path and allows for hands on work with data, and analysis of the cognitive development of children.

Kyndal Waldo

Kyndal is a freshman at the University of Washington majoring in Psychology. She has experience working with children with disabilities and is hoping to pursue a degree in Child Clinical Psychology after her undergraduate degree. Kyndal has a specific interest in working with children with ASD and other developmental / psychological differences. As an intern, Kyndal is excited to begin involvement in developmental and child research at the SCITL Lab.

Aryaman Gala

Aryaman is a senior majoring in Neuroscience. He is interested in eye tracking to identify neural markers of ASD and the analytical methods used to map social brain development. Aryaman previously work in the Neural Engineering and Rehabilitation Design Lab where he applied computational and statistical techniques to investigate the changes in neural activity in response to optogenetics. Aryaman’s future include pursing graduate studies in Computational Neuroscience with the goal of integrating technological faculties with Neuroscience to further understand and address neurological disorders.

Mia Nguyen

Mia is a senior majoring in Psychology graduating from the University of Washington in the Spring of 2022. She is interested in studying and being involved in pediatric research examining child cognitive development. Mia’s future plans include pursing a graduate degree in psychology to ultimately work within the field of psychology.

Meg Reninger

Meg is a senior majoring in neuroscience, graduating in the spring of 2022. She was drawn to neuroscience because of its unique combination of biochemistry, biology, and psychology, as well as its applications to everyday life and how we understand ourselves. In her free time, Meg love reading and going to bookstores. As an intern, Meg enjoys that each day looks a little different. Somedays she helps with participant meetings and data collection, and others she gets to see the behind-the-scenes administrative side of clinical research.

Tyler Reynolds

Tyler is a junior at UW, majoring in Public and Global Health and plans to become a physical therapist. In the lab, Tyler enjoys the behind-the-scenes aspects, such as data entry and preparing the materials for upcoming visits, as it reminds him of the scientific research he does for his major and feels fulfilling.