Now that I am halfway done with undergrad there are a few things I definitely want to accomplish in the two years that remain. I hope to keep being involved in research, hopefully continuing in my current internship. I also hope to use the time that I have left to take classes in various sciences that I may think I would want to do research in in the future, I want to use my time left to try new fields within biology/medicine. I also want to stay focused in my studies to ensure that my grades remain sufficient to achieve, or at least allow for, graduate school in some capacity.
Month: May 2019
This past year at OSU has been heavily influenced by my internship at the Institute for Genomic Medicine at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. For the few years prior I had been worried about figuring out what kind of doctor I wanted to be and how to go about the infamous medical school process. After being blessed with this opportunity I have had my eyes opened to an entire side of medicine at I had never considered before. I now want to pursue a future in research, maybe even in genomics, as I enjoy working in this lab so much and being able to learn so much about a field that’s constantly making new discoveries. I am so thankful for this opportunity as it has allowed me to experience something that I never would have considered before, and may hopefully get to do for a career someday.
Sophomore Year
With my second year at OSU in the books, I can now look back and see how things have changed since coming here. My intent when first coming to OSU was to go down the premed track and try to go to med school and in the meantime try to figure out what kind of doctor I want to be. Since then I have come to the loose conclusion that I no longer want to go to medical school and instead want to try to pursue a career in research. This choice comes from growing doubts and fears around the idea of medical school, as well as how much I enjoy my current position as a research intern at the Institute for Genomic Medicine at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. I hope that in the remainder of my undergraduate experience at OSU I can cement and refine this decision and put myself in the best possible position to achieve this goal.
Internship at Nationwide Children’s Hospital
Starting in Summer of 2018 to present I have been an intern at the Institute for Genomic Medicine at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. The lab I am at does gene sequencing for genomics research as well as some clinical samples. I have learned so much at this internship and I have been able to help out around the lab in numerous ways. I can measure DNA and RNA quality (concentration and length), prepare a DNA library for sequencing, help maintain a some of the sequencers in the lab, and analyze quality metrics from the sequencers to find trends in data. I have learned more at this job than I have in many if not all of my classes, from going to meetings and looking things up after, reading many research papers, listening to and asking questions to the various other people in the lab, I have been absolutely blessed with this experience. I am now interested in potentially shifting my career path to research due to how much I enjoy my time in the lab.