FUN FACT:
I love watching sports on television, especially North Carolina Tarheel basketball, and I have become a Red Sox fan since coming to Wellesley. Also, my grandmother, great-aunt, and two of my great-grandmothers went to Wellesley. It’s a tradition that I am very proud of.

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FAVORITE COURSE: My favorite science course at Wellesley was a seminar in Advanced Organic Chemistry (CHEM 317) because in it we were able to understand more deeply not just what chemical transformations are possible but also why those reactions happen in a specific way under different conditions. The course integrated ideas from almost all of the chemistry courses that I had taken and was highly collaborative. Class lectures were more like class discussions in which we as students talked through difficult concepts and followed our curiosity.

My favorite non-science course was a class in Chinese thought and religion because I fell in love with Confucianism and found that ideals that Confucius espoused mirrored my own even though I live in a culture dramatically different from that of ancient China.

YOUR PERSPECTIVES ON ACADEMICS: Since we do not have graduate students, we are in charge of our own research. Our professors teach us how to research and about different techniques, but we have autonomy over the experiments that we plan, carry out, and analyze. I love that I have had the experience of designing my own thesis project and figuring out how to overcome the difficulties that I have encountered along the way.

By studying science, I have learned to love the quirky Science Center. Often I find myself wandering back across campus to the lab to check a reaction, meet a friend in the lab, relax on the couches in the lab, and grab a snack. We have the best vending machines on campus, supplying every major food group.

The faculty here are fantastic. They are always available and interested in what we are doing, both with our science and with our lives. I drop in on several of my professors to ask a question relating to my research or just to chat regularly. The Chemistry Department is particularly close-knit, and students joke around with each other and our professors all the time. I have found many wonderful mentors who have helped me understand what the life of an academic chemist is like and have showed me how I can get there myself.

RESEARCH/INTERNSHIPS: I have done research on campus for two summers and three years, culminating this year in my senior thesis project. I am studying how a small molecule can bind to a protein that regulates insulin and turn off that protein’s regulatory ability. I love the project because I get to work on both the biology of the protein, with the help of our collaborators at New England Medical Center, and the chemistry in Professor Haines's lab at Wellesley.

During the summer after my sophomore year, I worked at the Organic Chemistry Institute of the University of Zurich. My adviser found me the position through a Wellesley alumna who had been a member of his research group. In Zurich, I was treated like the first year graduate students and gained an understanding of what graduate school would be like. Because of this experience, I have decided to go to graduate school myself.

FAVORITE THING ABOUT WELLESLEY: I really like studying chemistry at Wellesley, but the all-women’s environment has skewed my perception of the field. When my lab mates and I present our work at the American Chemical Society national meetings, we are always surprised that we present to an audience that is 80 to 90% male. We forget that not every chemist - and especially every chemist our age - is a woman. I like the reaction that I get at parties when I tell people that I am a chemist from Wellesley. First, it’s disbelief, then genuine respect.

DREAM JOB: I am going to graduate school in organic chemistry after graduation, but if I could not be a chemist, I would want to be a pastry chef. I love to bake and think that dessert is the best part of the meal.

FUN FACT: I love watching sports on television, especially North Carolina Tarheel basketball, and I have become a Red Sox fan since coming to Wellesley. Also, my grandmother, great-aunt, and two of my great-grandmothers went to Wellesley. It’s a tradition that I am very proud of.