Healthy Living Retreat for Women

Laurie Ausserer is co-director of the Healthy Living Retreat. She is a health promotion specialist, wellness coach, and a functional aging trainer. Laurie recently retired after 25 years at Stanford. While at Stanford, she managed the health education programs (Healthy Living) for the Health Improvement Program (HIP) and BeWell, and in the early years worked as clinic coordinator for a number of studies within the Stanford Prevention Research Center (SPRC). Laurie continues working as a health coach for the BeWell Program.

Julie Anderson is co-director of the Healthy Living Retreat. This is Julie’s 26th year coordinating the Well-being Check-ins (formerly known as Fitness Assessments) at Sierra Camp. She has a master’s in public health and is a National Board Certified Health & Wellness Coach. Julie is the Manager of Lifestyle Coaching in the Stanford BeWell program. She enjoys trail running/hiking, volleyball, watching musicals with her daughter, and camping with her family.

Gretchen Daily, PhD, is Bing Professor of Environmental Science and co-founder and faculty director of the Natural Capital Project at Stanford University. Her work focuses on understanding the dynamics of change in the biosphere, their implications for human well-being, and the deep societal transformations needed to secure people and nature. She engages extensively with governments, multilateral development banks, businesses, communities, and NGOs. Daily co-founded the Natural Capital Project (www.naturalcapitalproject.org), a global partnership that is integrating the values of nature into policy, finance and practice globally. Its tools and approaches are now used in 185 nations through the free and open-source Natural Capital Data & Software Platform. Daily has published several hundred scientific and popular articles, and a dozen books, including Green Growth that Works: Natural Capital Policy and Finance Mechanisms from Around the World (2019), One Tree (2018), and The Power of Trees (2012). Daily is a fellow of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and has received international honors for her work.

Patty was a 9-time NCAA All-American Athlete at Stanford University and after college started her own fitness & wellness company in 1995. Her clients included Cisco, Yahoo!, Google and Safeway. In 2009, she sold her corporate wellness division to Plus One (now Optum) and co-founded the Stanford Health Promotion Network (SHPN). Until 2022, Patty directed various faculty & staff wellness programs at Stanford, including Director of Strategic Projects for the Stanford WellMD Center (WellMD.Stanford.edu), and Director of Strategy, Innovation & Outreach for Stanford BeWell. Currently, Patty and her husband are crafting their retirement while developing Living Well USA, a 4.5 acre event center in the Santa Cruz Mountains for growth and celebration.

Kris Evans is a passionate social health psychologist and Ph.D. student at Stanford's Mind & Body Lab, where he explores the transformative power of mindsets on health, well-being, and performance. Kris’s research focuses on how we change our mindsets. He has published in the journals Experimental Psychology, Education Psychology, and Mindfulness, and others. With a holistic vision, Kris blends scientific rigor with practical wisdom, leveraging his extensive experience in yoga and mindfulness to empower individuals across athletic, educational, and organizational domains. He is driven by a commitment to fostering a world where everyone can build a happy, healthy, and fulfilling life.

Julie Foudy, Stanford Class of 1993, is the former Captain of the US Women’s Soccer team. Julie played on the US team for 17 years and participated in four Women's World Cups and three Olympics for Team USA. She is a two-time World Cup Champion, 2x Olympic Gold Medalist and 1x Olympic silver (White Gold) medalist. Julie is also the founder of the Julie Foudy & espnW Sports Leadership Academy, author, broadcaster for ABC, ESPN, and Turner Sports, podcaster (Laughter Permitted - check it out), author, mom to Izzy and Declan, and founding co-owner of Angel City Football Club in Los Angeles. Perhaps most significantly, she is the best chocolate chip pancake maker west of the Mississippi (source, Izzy and Declan).

Dr. Colleen Hacker is a Professor of Kinesiology at Pacific Lutheran University and has served as a member of the United States coaching staff for six Olympic Games as a Mental Skills Coach and Performance Psychology Specialist. In addition to her work with National Teams, Dr. Hacker works as the mental skills coach to professional, international and Olympic athletes in a variety of sports including Major League Baseball, the NFL, MLS, USA swimming, crew, speed skating, track and field, and tennis to name a few. Dr. Hacker has conducted extensive, applied research in the field of sport psychology with particular emphasis on peak performance, team building, leadership, mental toughness and psychological skills training for excellence. Her most recent book, “Achieving Excellence,” explores sport psychology concepts and provides practical, proven strategies to incorporate into your daily life and competitive career.

Jessia Hoffman, ’15 is the Founder & CEO of On Deck Workshops – a creative consultancy that levels-up team culture in real time. Jessia delivers human-centered, improv-based leadership programs to organizations like Google, Bloomberg, Kaiser, Intuit, Morrison Foerster, and Oracle. She is a Guest Lecturer at Stanford's Graduate School of Business, BeWell’s Healthy Living Program, Berkeley Haas, MIT Sloan, and the Knight Hennessy Program.  As a performer, Jessia is known for playing leading roles to audiences of 1,700+ and for improvising in hundreds of shows. She sang solo for Oprah Winfrey (they hugged!) and continues to perform fully improvised musicals with fellow Stanford alumni in San Francisco.

Colonel Nicole Mann, MS ’01 was selected by NASA in June 2013. She launched to the International Space Station (ISS) as commander of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 mission aboard the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, Endurance, on October 5, 2022. The Crew-5 astronauts lived and worked aboard the ISS for nearly six months as part of Expedition 68. During their mission, Crew-5 contributed to hundreds of experiments and technology demonstrations, including cardiovascular health, bioprinting, and fluid behavior in microgravity to prepare for human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit and to benefit life on Earth. After splashing down safely in their Dragon spacecraft off the coast of Tampa, Florida, on Saturday, March 11, NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 completed the agency’s fifth commercial crew rotation mission to the International Space Station. The international crew of four spent 157 days in orbit. Mann conducted two spacewalks totaling 14 hours, 02 minutes.

The California native holds a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering and a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering. Mann is a Colonel in the Marine Corps and served as a combat fighter pilot and test pilot in the F/A-18 Hornet and Super Hornet. She deployed twice aboard aircraft carriers in support of combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.  

She is the first indigenous woman from NASA to go to space. She is registered with the Wailacki of the Round Valley Indian Tribes.

Marily Oppezzo, PhD, MS, RD, is an Instructor of Medicine working on her K01 award from NHLBI at the Stanford Prevention Research Center. She is a learning and behavioral scientist, studying the best ways to help people not only change and improve their lifestyle behaviors, but also learn the tools to maintain this change. She is also a registered dietician, with her Masters in Nutritional Science and over two decades of experience teaching, coaching, and researching nutrition and exercise.

Dalia Perelman is a Registered Dietitian and a Certified Diabetes Educator. She has always been interested in both Nutrition research and its application in clinical practice and has worked in both environments. For 14 years she was a clinical dietitian at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation. She understands the power of diet in disease prevention and treatment and is currently working as a research dietitian at Stanford University with different groups, including Dr. Gardner’s team, to continue to elucidate the use of dietary measures to effectively promote optimal health. In her free time, she loves strolling through Farmer Markets, cooking with family and friends, hiking among the Redwoods, and doing jigsaw puzzles.

Zakia Rahman, MD, FAAD, is a Clinical Professor of Dermatology at Stanford Medicine where she directs the resident laser and aesthetic clinic. She is Affiliate Faculty at the Stanford Center on Longevity. Her clinical expertise includes lasers, energy-based devices, fillers, and neuromodulators for medical and aesthetic conditions,  artifice al intelligence in aesthetic dermatology, and physician wellness. Dr. Rahman also serves as a media expert for the American Academy of Dermatology, the American Society for Dermatologic Surgery, and Stanford Medicine. 

Jennifer Robinson, PhD, is the Associate Director for Christopher Gardner’s Nutrition Studies Group within the Stanford Prevention Research Center. She received her PhD in Nutrition from UC Davis and has been working in the field of health and wellness for over 25 years. In her personal time, you will find her baking sourdough bread, doing yoga, or spending time with her young daughter, husband, and chickens.

Rosalyne Tu, MS, RDN, has been working as a dietitian since 2003 and has been teaching the Healthy Kitchen series of classes at Stanford since 2011. She is currently a nutrition coach and instructor for Stanford BeWell’s Healthy Living program and manager of the BeWell Check-in.