UUGPGC Spotlight

Shivani is from Gilroy, CA.  She earned her B.S. in Genetics & Genomics and a Minor in Psychology from the University of California, Davis, in 2022. As an undergraduate student, she was involved in the Genetic Counseling Club.

As the president, she aimed to maintain a community where students could seek their interest in genetic counseling. Senior year, Shivani was trained to volunteer for Crisis Text Line as a resource for individuals.

Since graduation, she has worked at Golden Vision as an Optometric Technician, where she assisted patients in their appointments and was trained in Dry Eye Treatments. From working at an eye clinic, it has fostered her love for Ophthalmology. Shivani enjoys making funny food reviews for her friends and family in her free time and hanging out with her cohort.

Melissa is a second year genetic counseling student from Essex, VT. She earned a B.A. In biology from Ohio Wesleyan University in 2014 and an M.Ed. from Harvard Graduate School of Education in 2019. Melissa moved to Utah in 2015 to work for a wilderness therapy company focused on adolescent mental health. She worked as a field guide, leading groups backpacking and living in the backcountry. One of her favorite parts of this job was teaching wilderness survival skills, such as fire-making, shelter building, and spoon carving. She dabbled in other social-work related careers, such as school counseling, before finding the field of genetic counseling. She was drawn to this field as it utilizes her counseling experience with her education in the sciences.

Melissa loves to explore the mountains and open spaces of Utah. She has had a great time skiing, backpacking, and biking all over the west. One of her biggest goals in her 20’s was thru-hiking the three long trails in the US-the Appalachian Trail, Continental Divide Trail, and Pacific Crest Trail. In 2021 she completed this goal and is forever grateful to the people and places that she met along the way. Her most recent challenge is training for a desert trail marathon with her dog, Bolt, who is a great motivator.

Melanie Emmerson, MS, CGC, is a genetic counselor in pediatric cardiology at Primary Children’s Hospital. She graduated from the University of Utah Genetic Counseling Program in 2020 where she began her career in the Adult Cardiovascular Department at Intermountain Healthcare before transitioning to her current role. Here, she counseled individuals with potentially inherited cardiac conditions, such as cardiomyopathies, inherited arrhythmias, aortopathies, and dyslipidemias. She loves working with her collaborative and innovative team at Primary Children’s, where she’s gotten to see a wider variety of syndromic indications, and stretch her role to include counseling in the inpatient and fetal settings for children with congenital heart defects.

More recently, she began working part-time for the ReSeq research program, which uses novel diagnostic pathways to pursue genetic diagnoses in children who have not yet received a clear diagnosis through standard genetic testing. In addition to her clinical work, Melanie is actively involved with the UUGPGC, co-directing the GC Seminar II and III courses. She enjoys working with students and appreciates the enthusiasm and diverse experiences & perspectives that students bring to the field.

Originally from Toronto, Canada Melanie grew up skiing icy slopes and now enjoys the powder of the Utah ski scene. In her free time, she loves hiking Utah’s trails with her super-cute border collie, Maisy, and visiting National Parks. She and her partner recently bought a fixer-upper near Liberty Park and have been learning new DIY skills together.