{"id":3985,"date":"2022-05-27T13:38:05","date_gmt":"2022-05-27T17:38:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/?p=3985"},"modified":"2022-05-27T13:38:05","modified_gmt":"2022-05-27T17:38:05","slug":"academic-spark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/?p=3985","title":{"rendered":"Academic Spark"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Maggie Thompson<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

My path to being interested in science did not start as young as some. I spent many years dreaming of becoming a writer or an investigative reporter, who would travel the world to write news stories. Yet, during my sophomore year of high school, after I took a few more science courses, I realized that science, not writing, might be the right path for me. Wanting to further explore my newfound interest in science, I applied to a summer research program through Brown University and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention focusing on infectious and zoonotic diseases. I was accepted into the program and flew to Atlanta, GA to start my journey within science. During the week-long program, I found that I was more excited to attend lectures and labs than I had ever been about any academic subject\u2014I had found a passion for science!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            Following that experience, I took all the courses I could that were in the science field. I imagined myself working in a lab, discovering new treatments for diseases to make the world a healthier place. After graduating high school during a pandemic, I entered college, also in the middle of a pandemic and was met with new experiences left and right. As a Biomolecular Science major, I was taking courses that allowed me to dive even deeper into the world of drug development, the impact of vaccines, and the world of biomolecular engineering. After a full year of Biomolecular Science courses, I found that not only did I still love the field I planned on going into, but my interest and passion for it had grown even stronger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            During my freshman year, many\u2014if not all\u2014in person activities and even classes had been suspended, so I was unable to gain as much experience outside of classes as I wanted. So, when COVID restrictions began to let up during the fall of my sophomore year, I realized that it was time to get involved. I had already started working as a lab teaching assistant for the introductory biomolecular science courses but wanted to get involved with research. Towards the end of my fall semester, I began researching labs on campus and the Montclare lab immediately stood out to me\u2014they were studying exactly what I was interested in\u2014and I wanted to be a part of it. After reaching out to the lab and interviewing, I was ecstatic that they were willing to have me join as a member of their team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            In the lab I currently shadow Ph.D. candidate, Appy Bhattacharya and am learning the basics of protein engineering. I love working in the lab as every day is something different and I can look forward to learning new skills that will help me during the rest of my academic career and beyond. Everyone in the lab has been so welcoming and although I have only been a part of the team for about three months, I already feel like I have learned so much about not only the research being done but received great advice on how to be successful in the research field. I look forward to continuing to volunteer in the Montclare Lab and learning even more about the world of biomolecular science.<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Maggie Thompson My path to being interested in science did not start as young as some. I spent many years dreaming of becoming a writer or an investigative reporter, who would travel the world to write news stories. Yet, during my sophomore year of high school, after I took a few more science courses, I… Continue reading Academic Spark<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-posts","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3985"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3985\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3987,"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3985\/revisions\/3987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/montclare.poly.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}