Birgit Khandalavala, M.B.B.S.: Outstanding Mentor of Junior Faculty

Birgit Khandalavala, M.B.B.S., associate professor, family medicine, for the UNMC College of Medicine, will receive the Outstanding Mentor of Junior Faculty Award at the annual Faculty Senate Awards ceremony at 3 p.m. Tuesday in the Durham Research Center Auditorium.

• Name: Birgit Khandalavala, M.B.B.S.
• Title: Associate professor, UNMC Department of Family Medicine, College of Medicine.
• Joined UNMC: June 2012
• Hometown: Shillong, India

With how many junior faculty members do you work?

I work with five to seven junior faculty members.

What are the greatest rewards of mentoring?

• Proving to my children that there are people who actually benefit from my “experience” – and go on to blossom.
• Learning from the junior faculty.
• Reduced burnout.

Describe a moment when you realized your influence made a difference in someone’s career.

Recently, I saw one of my mentees take a leadership role at a national level, an accomplishment that I believed was impossible a year ago.

List three things few people know about you.

• I grew up in rural India, so rural that real tigers and elephants lived in the jungle nearby, and we did not have electricity for the first few years of my life.
• I speak more than five languages.
• I am not a person who goes to the gym.