“Renaissance Men” and Potential
By Adam Zamora ’97
I
n Eighth Grade Humanities at Saint David’s,
we learned that Leonardo da Vinci was a true
“Renaissance” man: a painter, sculptor, inventor,
surgeon, and more. Ultimately, he was someone who
wanted to understand how the world worked, and was eager
to improve upon previous ideas and techniques. With its
balanced curriculum, Saint David’s fostered in me a sense of
wonder and, like da Vinci, a desire to know how the world
around me worked. I think this love of learning is why
I ultimately developed an interest in human
emotions and behavior, and why I entered
the field of pediatric neuropsychology.
In addition to my work as
a child neuropsychologist, I
provide academic consultation
and remediation for students
who want to maximize their
academic potential. I am
particularly drawn to the work
of Carol Dweck, whose research
examines academic motivation,
achievement, and internalized
beliefs about intelligence. Dweck
highlights the importance of focusing
more on a student’s process and less
on their end product. Students who
believe that their intelligence can be
improved with effort are more
likely to face and
surmount academic difficulty than those who believe that
their intelligence is fixed.
The mindset that intelligence is mutable is something
that, itself, can be learned, and a concept I strive to instill
into my work with children. This became my focus
during my doctoral and post-doctoral training at NYU
Langone’s Rusk Rehabilitation Pediatric Program and
Columbia University Medical Center’s Promise Program.
At Rusk, while providing therapy and neuropsychological
assessments for children with traumatic
brain injuries, I learned the importance of
generating self-awareness of one’s strengths
and weaknesses in order to understand
and overcome challenges. Then, in
offering no-cost neuropsychological
assessments for children with learning
disabilities at the Promise Program, I
helped students identify underlying
cognitive weaknesses, developed
recommendations tailored to their
diagnoses, and taught families how
to advocate for their children in the
public education system.
Currently, I work as a clinical
neuropsychologist in the Child Mind
Institute’s Learning and Development
Center. Our team is dedicated to giving
children the tools they need
to manage learning
difficulties and
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