Katelyn Chandler Corey Davis’ love for learning and exploration began at UC Irvine in 2015 when she earned a Bachelor’s degree in public health sciences with a minor in statistics. Her drive for knowledge led her to pursue a Master’s degree in epidemiology at UCLA and following her tenure with two UC-campuses, she started her professional career in clinical research and in various capacities as a data analyst with the VA Greater Los Angeles Health Services Research and Development Center, UCI Dept. of Urology, UCI Department of Medicine – Research in Translational Technology Enabling High Quality Care (iTEQC) and for the UCSF Cancer Lab of Max Krummel.
Tragically in June 2022, Katelyn lost a year-long battle with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) with her loving husband, Ryan, mother, Elizabeth, father, Chris, and dear friend Nicole at her bedside. Despite having her life cut far too short, she made impressive professional accomplishments and was cited in more than 10 academic articles and talks.
In honor of her passion for research and public health sciences, Ryan and her family have decided to establish a scholarship in her name to support future public health practitioners where it all began – at UCI Public Health.
To share more about Katelyn’s inspiring life, her loving husband answers a few questions for the UCI community:
What drew Katelyn to be a strong advocate for education?
Katelyn was born with a recessive vision disorder called Leber’s Congenital Amaurosis that causes complete blindness by age 30. Despite that daunting diagnosis, Katelyn never saw it as a hindrance. From grade school to university, she participated in any and every activity, including being a star track and field athlete and becoming a member of the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority to testifying in front of the Food and Drug Administration on clinical trials for Leber’s. Her testimony recounted her experiences participating in one of the first clinical trials using an FDA-approved gene therapy, developed by Dr. Jean Bennett and Dr. Albert M. Maguire at the University of Pennsylvania, that halted her inevitable complete vision loss. Undoubtedly, her testimony had a profound impact on strengthening the pathway for a cure for future patients.
This experience only fueled her passion for science and its real-world impact on improving quality of life and well-being. Her undergraduate public health career honed that passion into a skill set that would help her co-author a publication as an undergraduate on the measles epidemic in Burundi, a country in East Africa, with Andrew Noymer, PhD, associate professor of population health & disease prevention at UCI Program in Public Health.
Her academic career continued with a Master of Science in epidemiology where her thesis focused on shedding light on the impact of alcoholism among veterans. Katelyn had just entered the workforce for a couple years equipped with all the tools she gained during her time at UCI and UCLA and was ready to make her mark as a public health practitioner when she received her cancer diagnosis.
Why did you choose to memorialize Katelyn with this legacy gift?
Beyond the fact that both Katelyn and I have fond memories during our undergraduate careers at UCI, Katelyn especially recognized how important it was for an institution to invest in well-rounded support mechanisms for its students – especially disabled ones. Katelyn felt that both UCI and UCLA’s disability centers took care of her unique needs so she could focus on what she loved doing most – learning.
This legacy gift honors Katelyn by giving back to UCI’s Program in Public Health, a community that inspired her career and gave her the foundation to become the researcher she had just started to share with the world. This gift will support students just like her who will question the status quo, dive into data to uncover hidden issues, and be the future of our public health workforce.
