Gifts addressing needs: The first-ever donor fund to support a JABSOM Graduate Student Program

The John A. Burns School of Medicine (JABSOM) has approximately 100 graduate students, who are working towards earning their Master’s or PhD, across five programs. How these students are supported to pursue their studies and develop research skills relies heavily on grant funding. For the first-time ever, a donor has provided a solution and established a fund to support a Graduate Student Assistantship (free tuition and a modest living stipend) for a student in one of JABSOM’s five graduate programs, the Developmental and Reproductive Biology (DRB) Graduate Program. Dr. Thomas Kosasa, professor emeritus of the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Women's Health at the University of Hawaiʻi (UH) medical school, established the Kosasa Graduate Student Assistantship.

“The Kosasa Fellowship strengthens a bridge between the Institute for Biogenesis Research (IBR), with which the DRB program is affiliated, and the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Pacific IVF. The fellowship is expected to foster high-quality reproductive research and mingling of basic and clinical research activities,” said Dr. Monika Ward, professor and DRB program chair.

Find out more information about the fellowship can be found:

Find out more about all of the graduate programs available at JABSOM.

To support a program or area at JABSOM of special interest to you, please contact Director of Development Julie Inouye at 808-692-0873 or julie.inouye@uhfoundation.org.