The fame behind my research

Today is the last day of my fall semester and as I reflect on it, I can honestly say it was one of the toughest most beautiful semesters I've ever witnessed. I knew from the start I needed to prepare for a tough semester because we were at a bad point of the pandemic.

This semester I was able to juggle 14 credits, 1 part-time job, 1 internship, a research project, preparation for graduate school, and preparation to take the GRE. I know everyone is proud of me, but most importantly I am extremely proud of myself.

This semester I also presented my research findings for the first time. In the past, I talked about my research and in the summer I presented a small portion of it, but this was the first time I actually spoke about my findings to an audience. It was intimidating but it felt so natural to talk about. Before presenting at the McNair symposium, I was extremely nervous. During the actual presentation, my emotions are at an all-time high and it felt so natural to talk about my project because it's my biggest passion and personally my biggest personal achievement. That was also the longest presentation I've ever given, so I feel like I can continue presenting and lose a lot of my nervousness after having so much practice. Although my research is not completed, I believe I gave a very good presentation on what I had so far, the audience was very engaged and were asking great questions at the end of it. Preparing for the presentation was very nerve-wracking, I spent tens of hours repeating what I wanted to say, but with only 10 minutes to present, I had a very hard time deciding what were the most important aspects and what I thought was the best information to present to the audience.

Another big event that happened to me this semester was having the opportunity to interview with the University of Wisconsin Eau Claire for a story about myself. I was extremely hesitant to agree because I am a very private person, especially about my personal life. I decided to continue with the story because I saw a good opportunity to share my research and spread awareness, which was my initial objective from the beginning of my research journey. I knew that spreading awareness about my research also meant that I needed to give personal information on where my passion to take this journey came from. Even if I don't feel comfortable with thousands of people knowing my personal life, it was something I needed to do because I cared more about my research being known and about advocating for women of color on our campus, so it wasn't about me.

In the next couple months I hope to conclude my research, which will be bittersweet because it's been with me for some time now and ending it will hurt. I'm thankful for McNair, my participants, my wonderful mentors who have guided me through so much, and to the audience that takes a second to hear my research.

If I continue onto graduate school, I hope to take the opportunity to continue my personal research. From my undergraduate research, I discovered that the problem cannot be solved during a person's undergraduate years, this problem originates from earlier years like high school. I hope to continue advocating for women of color and overall students of color.

In the next couple of months I hope to conclude my research, which will be bittersweet because it's been with me for some time now, and ending it will hurt. I'm thankful for McNair, my participants, my wonderful mentors who have guided me through so much, and to the audience that takes a second to hear my research.

I look forward to what the unknown future will bring me!