2026 Health System Simulation Faculty

Tara E. Brant

Speaker

Tara Brant earned a BA from the College of New Rochelle, where she majored in both political science and communications and holds a Master of Public Health (MPH) from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, concentrating in health policy and management.Brant was a member of the inaugural cohort of the Mailman Health System Simulation, quickly became a passionate advocate for its potential and spent the past 14 years serving as a faculty coach. She is one of the key data analysts offering expert interpretation and strategic insights into the evolution of hospital operations and systems-based learning.With over 20 years of experience in the healthcare industry, Brant spent a decade in hospital administration supporting graduate medical education at Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC). During her tenure, she played a pivotal role in establishing the hospital’s Hospice and Palliative Medicine Fellowship program.She later joined the Mount Sinai Hospital System in a process improvement capacity, driving initiatives in practice planning, patient-centered care and operational redesign. Brant also has extensive experience in continuing medical education (CME), where she has designed and implemented programs across a wide range of therapeutic areas. Her work often involves collaboration with hospitals and professional associations to develop quality improvement initiatives.One of her projects, “New Insights on the Role of Janus Kinase (JAK) Inhibition in Rheumatoid Arthritis” and the companion activity “Do You Know JAK?” received the 2019 Innovative Format Award from the Alliance for Continuing Education in the Health Professions (ACEHP). Brant is an active member of the ACEHP, has served in volunteer roles and has been published in the ACEHP Almanac.

Heather Butts, JD

Speaker

Heather M. Butts received her BA from Princeton University. She was a history major, concentrating in American and African American studies. She received her JD from St. John’s University School of Law, her master’s in public health from Harvard University and her master’s in education from Columbia University’s Teachers College.Professor Butts is an associate professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. She is also the faculty course lead for the leadership course at the Mailman School of Public Health.Professor Butts is the co-founder of the non-profit H.E.A.L.T.H. for Youths, Inc. The organization partners with 90 programs each year to help more than 7,000 students achieve their dream of going to college. Some of the projects the organization works with include little free libraries, food pantries, career preparation, public health projects and financial literacy.Butts’ publications include “Alexander Thomas Augusta: Physician, Teacher and Human Rights Activist” for the Journal of the National Medical Association, “Policy Perception: What Responses are Seen as Appropriate for COVID-19,” African American Medicine in Washington, D.C.: Healing the Capital During the Civil War Era and Healing Civil War Veterans in New York and Washington, D.C.

Betty C. Chang, MD, MHA

Speaker

Dr. Betty Chang is a distinguished physician leader and associate professor of Emergency Medicine at Columbia University Irving Medical Center (CUIMC). She also serves as the senior director of social emergency medicine and health equity within the Department of Emergency Medicine. A board-certified emergency physician with over 20 years of experience, Dr. Chang is widely recognized for her exceptional leadership, operational acumen, commitment to clinical excellence and dedication to advancing patient-centered care.After completing her chief residency at SUNY Downstate Medical Center and fellowship training at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center, Dr. Chang joined NewYork-Presbyterian in 2009. She was appointed medical director of the CUIMC Adult Emergency Department in 2014, where she managed an 86-bed unit serving more than 100,000 patients annually. In this role, she led major initiatives to optimize patient throughput, enhance quality and safety and strengthen interdisciplinary collaboration. Her leadership transformed departmental operations, aligning efficiency with compassionate, high-quality care.Deeply committed to training the next generation of healthcare professionals, Dr. Chang teaches medical students, residents and graduate students across Columbia’s medical and public health campuses emphasizing systems thinking, leadership and the intersection of emergency medicine and population health. Since 2022, she has served as faculty in the Columbia Health System Simulation course at the Mailman School of Public Health, where she applies her operational expertise to experiential learning in healthcare systems management. She also founded the ENGAGE program, which bridges clinical medicine and public health by involving graduate students in bedside health education and community engagement.Dr. Chang is a proud alumna of Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, where she earned her Master of Health Administration. Dr. Chang was selected to serve on the school’s alumni board and was recently honored with the Outstanding Alumni Award for Excellence. She currently holds an interdisciplinary appointment in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Mailman School, where she remains dedicated to advancing leadership development and academic collaboration.

Andrea Choi, MBA, MHA

Speaker

Andi Choi is currently the senior vice president for Finance and Administration at The New York Academy of Medicine (NYAM), a 178-year-old nonprofit organization committed to advancing healthier, longer lives for everyone through its innovative research, power of convening and bringing forth solutions that make a lasting impact in New York and beyond. Prior to joining NYAM, Choi held the role of assistant vice dean for Budget and Finance at the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University and has over 20 years of experience in financial management and strategy execution.During her tenure at Columbia, Choi successfully managed a substantial $2.4 billion budget while implementing turnaround strategies, creating long-range plans and improving financial processes. Choi also spent a decade at Mount Sinai Health System's strategic planning office and the Department of Medicine. In these positions, she provided financial and administrative oversight for the Department of Medicine and played a key role in supporting the vice president of Strategic Planning in various business and strategic planning activities, including space management.Choi holds a Master of Health Administration degree from Columbia University, an MBA with a concentration in healthcare from Baruch College and a bachelor’s degree from New York University. She has been a faculty member with the Thomas P. Ference Health System Simulation Program for five years and also participates as a project juror for the Baruch Healthcare MBA Capstone project each year.

Katherine Garrett

Speaker

Katherine Garrett is a lecturer in Health Policy and Management at the Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University. She is associate director of the department’s Health System Simulation, a faculty adviser in its consulting practice initiative and has taught classes on the relationship of organizational strategy and quality management in the department’s Master of Healthcare Administration programs.Garrett is also a consultant on performance measurement and improvement for not-for-profit organizations and a writer on health care policy and quality. She has over 30 years of experience in the healthcare industry, including acting as program designer and lead strategist for the 22-facility New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation's Quality Management initiative. Garrett’s consulting clients have included the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Fire Department of the City of New York and the American Academy of Pediatrics.Garrett has taught in executive education programs of Columbia Business School, the University of Reykjavik, Iceland and the Scuola Sant’Anna in Pisa, Italy. She has an MBA in finance with distinction from New York University and an AB cum laude from Harvard. As a volunteer, she has been a member of the Quality Assurance and Performance Improvement Committee of the board of directors of LiveOnNY (formerly the New York Organ Donor Network) and assistant alumni/ae area coordinator for the Center for Public Interest Careers at Harvard College.

Lee J. Hirsch, JD

Speaker

Lee J. Hirsch, JD, is a member of the faculty at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health in the Department of Health Policy and Management where he teaches in Columbia’s Consulting Practice and the Thomas P. Ference Health System Simulation. In addition, he also teaches personal leadership in public health to first year MPH students. Hirsch is an attorney in private practice specializing in healthcare and corporate transactions but has been practicing law for over 30 years in a variety of settings. Some of Hirsch’s experience includes being an associate and partner of an international law firm where he specialized in healthcare, private equity, securities law, and mergers and acquisitions.Subsequent to his law firm life, he became general counsel at NewYork-Presbyterian Lower Manhattan Hospital, formerly known as New York Downtown Hospital. His career has focused on physician practices, regulatory compliance, healthcare structures and the acquisition and disposition of healthcare organizations. During his tenure at New York Downtown Hospital, he was a member of the senior management team of the hospital as he served as a senior vice president, responsible for legal affairs, risk management and compliance. He served as interim head of human resources and acted as chief of staff to the CEO and liaison to the board of trustees of the hospital. He was involved in a variety of operational issues and confronted the challenges of a small, New York City-based, community hospital. Hirsch earned his Juris Doctorate from the NYU School of Law and has a master’s degree in public health from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health.

Aaron Myers, DDS

Speaker

Dr. Aaron Myers is the senior associate dean for Clinical Affairs at Columbia University College of Dental Medicine (CDM), overseeing all aspects of clinical operations across the teaching clinics, which provide more than 100,000 patient visits each year. Before being appointed as clinical dean in 2024, he served as CDM’s chief dental officer and clinic director of the Pediatric Dentistry Clinic.Dr. Myers is a board-certified pediatric dentist and associate professor in the Division of Pediatric Dentistry at CDM. He teaches predoctoral dental students and pediatric dentistry residents in both didactic and clinical settings.He earned his undergraduate degree from Cornell University and his dental degree from Columbia University CDM. He went on to complete his pediatric dentistry training at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University. Dr. Myers also holds a master’s degree in public health from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health.His contributions to dental education and the profession have been recognized with the Guy Metcalf Teaching Award for dedicated and compassionate clinical instruction and he has been inducted as a Fellow of the American College of Dentists.

Mohamed R. Nakeshbandi, MD

Speaker

Dr. Nakeshbandi is the vice president/chief medical officer at SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University. In this capacity, Dr. Nakeshbandi provides strategic leadership to the medical staff and leads clinical operations in the hospital, ensuring the highest standards of patient care. Dr. Nakeshbandi spearheads the High Reliability Organization journey and the health equity initiatives at the institution, advancing culture of safety, quality and equity in healthcare delivery.Before assuming his current role, Dr. Nakeshbandi was the chief quality officer at Downstate, where he played a key role in planning, implementing and monitoring quality measures, regulatory compliance and process improvement. His leadership in these areas resulted in significant improvements in quality measures, including reduction in hospital-acquired infections, enhancement in Patient Safety Indicators and better performance in Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set (HEIDS) measures.For his leadership and accomplishments, Dr. Nakeshbandi has received several awards, including induction into the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society for academic excellence and leadership in medicine in 2024, the CLEAR Healthcare Heroes Award in 2020 and the Tribute to Excellence in Healthcare Award in 2019.Dr. Nakeshbandi earned a master's in healthcare administration at Columbia University, an MD from Aleppo University School of Medicine, completed his internal medicine residency at West Virginia University and a fellowship in infectious disease at SUNY Downstate.In addition to his administrative leadership, Dr. Nakeshbandi is an associate professor of medicine and public health at SUNY Downstate and an adjunct assistant professor of public health at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

Contact Info: Mohamed R. Nakeshbandi, MD
Vice President & Chief Medical Officer
SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University

John S. Winkleman

Speaker

John S. Winkleman teaches healthcare marketing and directs the Health System Simulation and consulting practice. The Health System Simulation is also part of training programs at NewYork-Presbyterian, NYC Health + Hospitals, Mount Sinai, the American College of Healthcare Executives, CVS/Aetna HEAL and Bocconi University. He is senior judge for the annual HPM Healthcare Delivery and Management Case Challenge and faculty for Practicum Day. For over a decade, he was adjunct faculty at Fordham's Center for Nonprofit Leaders and taught marketing and fundraising at Columbia Business School's Institute for Not-for-Profit Management.Winkleman founded Winkleman Company in 1990 after working in the public relations industry, in the administration of Clark University and as director of NYC's Greenwich House Music School. Winkleman Company specializes in media relations, reputation management, speaker training, collateral development, public service outreach, brand marketing, strategic positioning and assessment.As a trustee emeritus of the Mount Sinai Hospital, he chaired its community and government relations committee, was a long-time member of the Public Affairs/Marketing committee, executive committee, Multicultural & Community Affairs advisory board and the Mount Sinai Hospital's Community Advisory Board. Currently, he is on the community and government relations committee, quality committee and counsel to Marketing. He also serves on the advisory boards of CIVITAS and New Yorkers for Parks.Winkleman served on the board of the Association of Fund-Raising Professionals NYC, was one of the founders and co-chairs of their National Philanthropy Day Celebration and a co-founder of the Conference on Sustainability in the Nonprofit Sector at Columbia. For over 20 years, he has been the co-author of the Top Ten List at NYC’s National Fund-Raising Day.He received the 2024 Judson Wolfe Excellence in Teaching Award from Columbia University, 2008 United Hospital Fund Distinguished Trustee Award, 2009 Our Town Entrepreneurship Award, 2011 CIVITAS Tribute Award and special recognitions from the Mount Sinai Center for Excellence in Youth Education and the NYC Chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals.

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