Informational Interview

I conducted my Informational Interview with Nadia Asous, a first year graduate student at The Ohio State University. She was my Teaching Assistant for my General Chemistry class. Her undergraduate major was chemistry, a major that I am interested in. Being a recent graduate who now is working as a TA, she was able to offer the insight of both a Senior student and someone soon to become a working professional.

Interview Questions with Nadia’s Answers:

  1. Can you describe the process by which you arrived at your undergraduate major?

So, in high school, I took chemistry my sophomore year, and I liked it a lot because I ask a lot of questions. I like knowing how things work and why, and chemistry tends to answer that. Then, I had really good professors for general chemistry in college, and I was looking forward to taking quantum chemistry. I explored other things, thinking I wanted to be a lawyer or a businessperson. I took some classes and hated them. The only thing I liked was chemistry, so I decided I wanted to be a chemical engineer. When I was learning about chemical engineering in college, I realized it very math heavy, and didn’t focus enough on the theory of chemistry, so I dropped that. Since I liked my General Chemistry labs and the research my professor conducted, I thought that I could take that and apply it. I did want to learn the fundamentals first though, because that’s what answers my many questions!

 

  1. What was your favorite course in college within your major, and why did you like it?

        My favorite course within my major college was Inorganic Chemistry. Our class was geared towards learning about transition metals, and the chemistry that is involved with transition metals. In the beginning of the course, we learned about how cubic lattices form and pack, and about different crystal structures. Then, we went on to talk about the different chemistry that metals do. They do a lot of catalysis. When you go into industry, the only reason that a lot of processes work is because of these metals. The metals are really cool, and I really like them. The final part of the course was geared towards my professor’s research, which I ended up doing, and that involved metalloproteins. These proteins have metal sensors, and the nitrogen sources and photosynthesis that you’ve learned about are possible because of these proteins’ metal sensors. I enjoyed learning about what the metals do, and I really liked that class because it added different kinds of chemistry in one.

 

  1. What was your favorite course outside of your major, and why did you enjoy it?

I absolutely love jazz! I took this class that wasn’t a normal jazz class where you sit there and learn about the history of jazz, and it was a music major class where you learn about only the music. It was a mix where we learned how jazz developed from rock music and from different cultures in Latin America and in African American societies. We also would listen to music and we would interpret the meaning. My professor would put in history in a socioeconomic sense rather than just a historical sense. This was super cool for me because I’m really into talking about socioeconomics and culture, and I love music!

 

  1. What kinds of extracurricular experiences (research, internships, co-ops, student organizations, study abroad, etc) did you have in college? How did those experiences benefit you?

I applied to a lot of things my first summer, but nobody really wanted a freshman who had no experience. The second summer, I started doing research with the professor who was my General Chemistry professor and my Inorganic chemistry professor. At first, he didn’t really believe how interested I was in his work, but I proved to him that I really liked what he studied. So briefly, what he does is study a protein that comes from bacteria that helped clean up the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. I thought it was awesome, since it was relevant in chemistry and could be applied. In terms of extracurricular activities besides research, I joined a leadership program, but it wasn’t exactly what I wanted. The cool part was that we got to manage a budget and create our own volunteer events. There was one week where we toured the city and visited different schools and met with principals to see how they exhibited leadership. We also went to city hall and talked to people in politics about how they applied leadership. I thought it was cool, but I don’t think a lot of the people in the program understood the situations we were evaluating. We never worked with any people who were struggling financially, and I was frustrated that I wasn’t able to have deeper conversations with people, but it was still a good experience.

 

  1. What advice would you give somebody who wants to pursue a chemistry major?

It’s really easy to get discouraged by grades. One thing I noticed in undergrad was that people would chose majors based on what they think they’re best at, rather than what they like the most. I was not an A student at all, but I loved chemistry enough that I still wanted to do it even when I wasn’t doing as well as I wanted academically. My advice would be to really pursue what you want, because if you show how dedicated you are and how much you’re interested, that gets you a lot farther than getting an A. I knew 4.0 students who didn’t get into the graduate schools they wanted because they didn’t show interest.

 

Answers to Synthesis Questions:

  1. How did you find this interviewee, and why did you choose to interview this person?

I found Nadia, through her being the Teaching Assistant for my General Chemistry class. She is in her first year of graduate school at Ohio State, so she was able to offer the insight of both a Senior Student, and someone on the path of a working professional. I chose to interview her because I have an interest in chemistry and she completed an undergraduate major of chemistry. I hoped to learn more about her academic journey and receive some good advice about the chemistry major from someone who has already been through the undergraduate process.

 

  1. How has this interview influenced your major and/or career exploration?

This interview has made me more inclined to declare chemistry as my major. I am still undecided at this point, but chemistry has been one of the majors that I’ve been heavily considering, and Nadia’s enthusiasm about chemistry has influenced me to want to commit to it.

 

  1. Did you learn anything unexpected from the interview? If so, what? If not, which ideas did the interview reinforce?

I did learn something rather unexpected from the interview! I had thought grades were of the utmost importance, but I found out from Nadia that they do not necessarily mean everything when you are looking towards graduate school. I learned that demonstrating your interest in your major through your extra-curricular activities can be very important in securing opportunities after undergrad.

 

  1. What do you feel you still need to learn about this major/career before being able to make a confident decision?

I feel that I still need to learn about the different career opportunities that are available for someone who pursues a chemistry major. Nadia explained to me that there are research, industry, and teaching opportunities for those that study chemistry, but I do not know the details about each of these career paths. In order for me to make a confident decision to study chemistry as my major, I want to have an extensive knowledge of the opportunities that would be opened up for me after completing my studies.

 

  1. Which major exploration tools/activities/resources that you utilized this semester were most helpful to you and why?

The major exploration resources that were most helpful to me this semester were the college overview quizzes and their corresponding videos. These provided a nice summary of the majors offered within the different colleges of the university, which was enough information to decide if a given major was something that I might be interested in.