After graduating from Notre Dame with a degree in chemical engineering, I began my time as a medical student at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. While I explored my math and engineering interests in my courses at Notre Dame, I delved into my interest in medicine during summer break. I took full advantage of the credibility and funding The Hesburgh-Yusko Scholars Program (HYSP) offered, and spent my summers working for a medical nonprofit at home and abroad, performing cancer biology bench science research in the United Kingdom, and carrying out breast cancer clinical research at the Mayo Clinic. In the end, my passion for medicine won out and I was off to medical school.

Since arriving at Johns Hopkins two years ago, I have been involved in a variety of activities. I represented Johns Hopkins at national meetings of the American Medical Association, and I co-authored a policy resolution on genetic counseling that was adopted by the AMA Medical Student Senate and Physician House of Delegates. I have also worked in the Johns Hopkins Department of Neurosurgery doing research on spine tumors, and have actually continued my breast cancer research that I began at the Mayo Clinic during one of my HYSP summers.

In terms of carrying on the spirit of service I learned at Notre Dame, I work with a nonprofit called the Baltimore Harm Reduction Coalition to train community members and healthcare providers on how to respond to opioid overdoses with the reversal drug naloxone. I also work with a Johns Hopkins student group to provide free vision screenings and eye assessments to Baltimore communities; the group works to connect patients to free eye care services at the Johns Hopkins Hospital if it turns out treatment is indicated for them. Within my own medical school community, I serve as a peer advisor to first-year students, and I was the president of the Johns Hopkins Catholic Medical Student Association last year.

I have so far enjoyed an incredible experience at Johns Hopkins, and I look forward to continuing my exploration of this rewarding profession. Speaking for myself, I truly must credit Hesburgh-Yusko for the love I developed for medicine over my college career, as it is only through this program that I was able to have the experiences in medicine that I did as an undergraduate; I have always been one taken by a diversity of interests, and The HYSP enabled me to deeply explore them all throughout college.