Some Things Change, but Others Remain the Same.

As a child, I was always curious and adventurous. I was your typical girl in the fact that I loved to play with dolls and dance, but I also had just as much fun playing kickball with the neighborhood boys and hunting for toads. Scary movies fascinated me (they're still my favorite) and I absolutely loved going with my mom to the Red Cross when she donated blood. To this day, my mom tells me I would be right up close saying, "Squeeze the ball harder, mommy!" as she worked to get the blood pumping into the bag.

I'm sure many of you are thinking.."Hmm, pretty strange kid." The thing is, these small details are telltale signs and predictors of the person I have grown to become. All through high school I excelled and adopted a particular love for science. I took all the courses offered as well as AP courses for college credit. As a junior in high school, I was awarded the Golden Scalpel Award for best dissections in my Human Anatomy and Physiology class. The body, whether human or animal, and its systems, were never something that made me feel queasy or uncomfortable. Instead, I marveled over their intricacy and functional capabilities; I loved being able to learn for myself through hands on interaction.

In college, I was admitted into the University of Minnesota's School of Nursing as a freshman guarantee student. This was an incredible achievement since Minnesota's nursing school is rumored as one of the hardest schools to get into on campus. It is surely one of the most renowned nursing programs in the country as well. Throughout my first year and a half of nursing school I took advantage of opportunities to partake in graduate level physiology short courses to be able get into the cadaver lab. My bank of knowledge has acquired so much material and continues to expand daily.

After a year and a half in nursing school, I realized my heart wasn't passionate about the job of being a nurturer to others, it just wasn't the right fit for me. I knew this, because I didn't feel complete and I wasn't enthusiastic about becoming a nurse the way I should have been and the way other students around me were. I withdrew from the program in search of finding a major that really awoke something inside of me. After tossing different ideas around, researching, and speaking to countless people, I was able to discover the best possible match for me. It was never a question in my mind my career would still be heavily science based even if I wasn't going to be a nurse. My lifelong love followed me through college, despite it being a time where I have learned the most about myself and what I want to do with my life. Many changes have taken place, but my passion for science has remained the same.