Grace volunteering at a Health Clinic in Port-au-Prince, Haiti during the summer of 2014. Photo: Jaelyn Furey
During the summer of 2014, I was able to travel to Port-au-Prince, Haiti, where I learned about the culture and struggle of the Haitian people. I was able to work a medical clinic and was also shown orphanages and delivery hospitals in order to gain more understanding of the conditions of the Haitian society. I had never experienced such poverty before and this trip was a rude awakening to what other countries outside of the US are dealing with.
Conducting research in the Biomechanics Lab in the New Center for the Sciences. Photo: Dr. Laura Gruss
I have absolutely loved throwing myself into the Biology department of Radford University. I feel as if my exposure to biological research is just beginning and that I am excited to have built a solid foundation at RU.
While growing up, both of my grandmothers lived with me, and through that I was able to get a passion for health and care-taking. My mom set a great example of that as she was a nurse during the day and a care-taker along with my father in the evenings. I loved the way that my mom knew what the effects of medications were and that started my desire to learn more. During my senior year of high school, my mom had a stroke and I was the one who found her. If it had not been for my learning in my pre-health classes and God's timing, I would not have known what to look for or what to do. Thankfully I was able to call 911 and she was treated as quickly as possible. This shocking experience led me to want to know more about the body and its functions and led me to come to Radford University.
Through college I have been able to grow in my knowledge of the body and have loved classes like Exercise Physiology, Endocrinology, Anatomy and Physiology, Virology, and Biochemistry. Starting in fall 2016, Dr. Gruss in the Biology department at RU, took me onto her research team and allowed me to come up with my own research project. I began studying the bio-mechanics of dance and have thoroughly enjoyed doing so. I am hoping to be able to experiment and test my proposed study of the force generation in the dance pirouette turn. Regardless of whether or not my research gets approved, I am thankful for what I have learned thus far.
As you can see my passions in the field of biology are very vast. This excites me because it allows me to know that I have options and have the opportunity to learn much more!