Gradwell
About the GradWell initiative
Keep track of your academic goals, personal milestones, and build resilience throughout your graduate degree using the GradWell mobile app.
An unfortunate, emerging trend worldwide is that graduate students are at a higher risk of experiencing mental health issues. GradWell serves to enhance student wellbeing throughout one’s academic journey by providing a mobile toolkit filled with tips, guidance and resources to help navigate common academic and personal challenges that arise along the way. Two core features of GradWell that are designed to strengthen resilience include:
- Milestones: student-crafted, blog-style posts with relevant information and links to help you navigate both academic and personal challenges. Create your own personalised checklist of milestones to follow along your degree!
- Resources: GradWell serves as a central hub for access to wellness resources offered by the University of Toronto and beyond. Wellness is more than just monthly yoga workshops, so discover ways to get active, get involved in student groups and much more through the GradWell app.
Contact GRADWELL: gradwell.uoft@gmail.com
GradWell. Built for students, by students.
Meet our Founding Team
Dustin Ammendolia is a 7th year PhD student in the Department of Molecular Genetics. His graduate work entails dissecting host-pathogen interactions during Listeria monocytogenes-induced foodborne illness. Midway through his graduate studies, Dustin developed a keen interest on how to improve graduate student wellness which inspired his involvement as a co-founder of GradWell. Alongside academic research, Dustin’s passions include running, posting tasty food on Instagram, and watching the Toronto Raptors try to repeat the 2018-2019 championship run.
Contact: dustin.ammendolia@mail.utoronto.ca
Grace Jacobs completed her PhD at the Institute of Medical Science in 2021 under Drs Aristotle Voineskos and Stephanie Ameis. Her research uses structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to study how neurobiology is associated with heterogeneous symptoms, functioning and outcomes across youth experiencing mental illnesses. In addition to co-founding GradWell, Grace was actively involved in a number of science communication initiatives throughout her graduate degree, such as the Raw Talk Podcast, Pueblo Science Charity, Let's Talk Science, and Brain Waves. Grace is currently a postdoctoral research fellow at Harvard Medical School.
Contact: grace.jacobs@mail.utoronto.ca
Lazar completed his PhD at the Institute of Biomedical Engineering in 2021 under Drs. Cesar Marquez-Chin and Milos Popovic. His thesis was focused on testing the possibility, practicality, and efficacy of using advanced technologies (such as electroencephalography, brain-computer interface, and functional electrical stimulation) to boost rehabilitation outcomes for people recovering from stroke and spinal cord injuries. Lazar had been continuously engaged with the university’s graduate student community, starting as the athletic director in the Biomedical Engineering Students’ Association, then an executive member at ILead:Grad, and finally co-founding GradWell. At the moment, Lazar is building his company Summations - focused on increasing access to research publications in education and beyond.