Pritzker M2 Alausa Receives MLK Legacy Award from Chicago Bulls

Second-year Pritzker student Jameel Alausa has received a 2024-2025 MLK Legacy Honoree Award from the Chicago Bulls in recognition of his efforts with the novel Sneakers to Scrubs initiative.

Alausa will be honored by the team along other 2024-2025 honorees during halftime of its Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day Game on Friday, January 17. The awards given annually since 2020 recognize Chicago residents who "demonstrate a passion for achieving equity and a commitment to address persistent challenges related to social justice and equity.”

Alausa co-founded Sneakers to Scrubs in late 2023 with fellow Pritzker students Marcus Allen and Solomon Egbe and Rush University medical students Lord Hyeamang and Eric Robinson, tapping into their shared backgrounds as former college and professional athletes with a goal of increasing the number of Black men in the field of medicine. Alausa played Division I basketball at Yale University, Allen played at Stanford University before stints with the Los Angeles Lakers and Karhu Basket in Finland, and Egbe played Division I football at Harvard University.

The group employs these athletic backgrounds to connect with underserved students on youth football and basketball teams on the South and West Sides of Chicago, providing mentorship, leadership skills, and exposure to medical careers. Sessions with students include topics like concussion awareness, first aid, and a variety of careers in medicine.

“We are so proud of Jameel and the work that Sneakers to Scrubs is doing to empower young people in our community and to address the critical need for increased representation in the field of medicine,” said Vineet Arora, MD, MAPP, Dean for Medical Education at Pritzker. “This is a well-deserved recognition of the hard work that Jameel and his co-leaders have done to help more student-athletes follow their footsteps into medical careers.”

Alausa is a Chicago native who attended University of Chicago Lab Schools, where he won four Independent School League championships and three regional titles. While earning his bachelor’s degree in economics at Yale, Alausa helped the Bulldogs win three Ivy League Championships and reach the NCAA Tournament before continuing his pursuit of a career in medicine.

As a member of the Pritzker community, Alausa has invested significantly in community engagement. As a first-year student, he served as Education and Community Outreach Coordinator for the South Side Free Clinic, which provides no-cost primary care services to the Black adult population on the South Side, and led recruitment efforts for the Health Professions Recruitment and Exposure Program (HPREP), which provides medical career guidance and teaches emergency response skills to South Side youth.

Sneakers to Scrubs has now held more than 60 events and reached more than 1,500 students. Last week, the program was announced as one of three recipients of an Illinois Black Men in Medicine Innovation Grant from the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) and National Medical Association. The $20,000 grant aims to support programs focused on increasing the representation and engagement of Black men in medicine.