As freshmen in college, it is important to assess the opportunities available to us. Through individual conversations with a graduate student, an upperclassman, and a professor, I was able to reflect how I should approach my undergraduate degree in regards to studying, socializing, and planning for medical school. As a STEM major attending an R1 institution, I find it as a great chance to take advantages of the opportunities presented to me and use those as assets when seeking jobs in the STEM field. Furthermore, by conversing with people that have already been through the process of being a first year college student, I am able to prepare for the burdens that one might encounter during freshman and undergraduate years.

When trying to complete this assignment, the first hurdle was determining whom to interview. It was important that I found someone who was interesting, had the time to converse, and most importantly, had the same or similar major as me: biochemistry. I first looked to my STEM EE Scholars peer mentor, Leah Pastor, because she is a biochemistry major. Finding her was the easiest of the three people because I knew a bit about how she felt about our major via the ice cream social at the beginning of the year. Throughout the interview with Leah, I learned about what classes I would be taking when trying to attain my B.S. in biochemistry, how to find internships, and how to get involved in extracurricular activities. The thing that stood out most to me was Leah’s mention of the class Biochemstiry 2900H. Leah had the same problem as me, she declared the major, but did not know what biochemistry full encompassed. That, coupled with the fact that biochemistry majors don’t get into a biochemistry class until their fourth semester on campus, left us wondering if we chose the major that would fit us best. Biochemistry 2900H allows people to look into early research opportunities in the field. Each week, two professors speak to a class of 2^nd and 3^rd year biochemistry majors hoping to find a student that wants to partake in their field of research. At the end of the week, the class is required to write a paper of what the researcher talked about. Afterwards, the paper goes to the researchers. At the end of the year, each student is to pick their top 5 presenters and if the researcher likes the paper, he or she can select the student to participate in their research. Not everyone is guaranteed a spot on a research team, but it’s still an advantage over people looking for research opportunities blindly.

After my interview with Leah, I had to find a gradate student to interview. My chemistry recitation TA came to mind because his class was my favorite to go to. By just observing Stephen Londo during class, I was able to gather, that he was very willing to accept student’s curiosity. When emailing him, I first made sure his undergrad major was similar to mine, and it was. He graduated from Loyola University with a B.S. in physical chemistry and a minor in math. During his interview, I tried to steer the conversation towards how to succeed in my undergraduate years. His advice to me was thorough. He told me that trying to find research opportunities early on is very essential in developing practical skills in a lab. He explained that by doing this, you are establishing yourself as having initiative while making diverse relationships. In order to find research opportunities, he encouraged establishing strong relationships with the people around you- specifically, the professors. Stephen explained that because Ohio State is a big school, it is hard for professors to get to know each and every person. So, by going to office hours and leaning on them with your struggles of the class, they are better able to put a name to a face and would be more willing to take you on as an undergrad researcher in the future. Overall, Stephen encouraged me to first and foremost build the network that could lead me to success.

Finally, I looked to my chemistry professor. After deciding to interview Dr. Allen, I needed to find and read up on her research so I could be better prepared to talk to her during the interview. In the online department directory of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Dr. Allen was listed. When I scrolled down her page, I saw all the works she’s published. To download her publications, I just click the pdf file and I knew these works were peer reviewed because many of the authors have PhD’s and there is a lengthy list of references. Furthermore, many of the authors are professors at this university and are thus are well connected to the scientific community. Reading her publications were difficult due to the fact that it was very in depth with complex language. Moreover, I felt like I was not the appropriate audience for the paper. I felt as if the paper was directed more towards the scientific community of PhD graduates and other scientists. The media within the science field is very easy to find because science depends on building upon other’s works, but trying to understand enough about Dr. Allen’s works to converse with her was difficult. In the end, I just ended up reading only the medical related research papers and because I was more interested in that field I found those papers a bit easier to comprehend.

I learned a lot about Dr. Allen and field of chemistry research during the interview. I learned that she is required by the university to publish around 10 papers per year and that an extensive amount of work is put into this. She explained that the job of being a researcher is run pretty much like a business in that you need to network, raise your own funds, and need to find people to work under you. What interested me about this is how much business is put into this part of STEM, yet no business classes are required for getting a degree when wanting to progress to a research oriented post-grad. Moreover, her advice to me in trying to get a spot in undergraduate research was to be persistent. Her specific requirements for the undergraduates she takes into consideration are a 3.3 GPA, a year commitment, 2 credit hours in the lab per semester, 20 hours a week during the summer, and ability to put out legitimate work that’ll actually contribute to the research rather than just being there to get experience. Dr. Allen overall really put the research chemistry field into perspective for me; before this interview I wasn’t aware of how far chemistry could take you after college.

After all these interviews, I was left with pages and pages of positive material and advice that I hope will stay with me for all the years that I stay with Ohio State. Conversing with all these people that I now look up to, brought me out of my shell and allowed me to understand better what is expected of me as a STEM student. My takeaway from this experience is that, college is not the high school we are used to. It’s serious and everyone around you is now considered a competitor whether you are applying for your specific college within OSU next year, graduate school after finishing your undergraduate degree, or even medical school. However, despite the seriousness of college, there is always time to be involved outside of school. College is about making the most of the experiences and opportunities that you can get.

Publications of Dr. Allen read before the interview:

1. V. Coe, Z. Chen, R. Li, R. Butke, B. Miller, C. L. Hitchcock, H. C. Allen, S. P. Povoski, E. W. Martin, Jr; Imaging Infrared Spectroscopy for Fixation-Free Liver Tumor Detection, Proc. SPIE 8947, 89470B/1-89470B/6 (2014).

1. Hua, D. Verreault, E. M. Adams, Z. Huang, H. C. Allen; Impact of Salt Purity on Interfacial Water Organization Revealed by Conventional and Heterodyne-Detected Vibrational Sum Frequency Generation Spectroscopy, J. Phys. Chem. C 117(38), 19577-19585 (2013).

J. V. Coe, Z. Chen, R. Li, S. V. Nystrom, R. Butke, B. Miller, C. L. Hitchcock, H. C. Allen, S. P. Povoski, E. W. Martin, Jr.; Molecular Constituents of Colorectal Cancer Metastatic to the Liver by Imaging Infrared