MeiWa Li: Using accounting knowledge to tackle health care challenges

MeiWa Li has her sights set on a career in health care services. The University of Maine junior from Hong Kong is an accounting major who interned at athenahealth last summer in Belfast. The fast-growing company, which provides cloud-based services for managing electronic medical records, medical billing, patient engagement and care coordination, assigned Li to be an operation analyst in its payer enrollment department.

Li reviewed the workflow for the department, doing some root cause analysis and proposing solutions for efficiency. The project was fun, she says, and very challenging.

Li came to Maine to attend high school at Maine Central Institute in Pittsfield. At Kennebec Valley Community College, she studied to earn her license to become a radiology technologist. When Li decided to continue her education, she enrolled at UMaine.

She commutes to Orono from Hartland, where she lives with the same family that hosted her when she attended MCI. At UMaine, Li has thrived. She has a 3.9 GPA.

“I’m really impressed with how they organize so many resources to help students,” says Li, including the many opportunities to talk with employment recruiters at the annual UMaine Career Fair.

“What I love most,” Li says, are UMaine professors who “will go out of their way to help you if you need it.”

One thing she’s likely to miss when she graduates in May 2018 is the New Balance Student Recreation Center.

“Especially after a long day of classes, it’s a good place to go and work out and relieve some of the stress and go to the sauna.”

Contact: Jay Field, 207.581.3721; 207.338.8068