Hi there! My name is Jenny and I'm a senior at Dartmouth studying biology and quantitative social science. On campus, I also work as a communications intern for the Admissions Office, tutor local high school students through Health Access for All, and mentor freshmen in the Great Issues Scholars LLC. My hobbies include reading (especially dystopian and historical fiction) and embroidering, which I only recently picked up. I hope you enjoy my blog!
I looked forward to this class every week, partly because of the professor and partly due to the content. We read books on a wide variety of topics, ranging from privilege and how it affects our interactions with others to restaurant kitchens and the hierarchies inherent in surgical residencies.
Biol13 is structured so that you have to work as a group on difficult class problems and even on some exams, which was novel to me and pushed me to really understand the material. This class inspired me to pursue research (both off-campus and on-campus) related to genetics.
Although this class was daunting to me in the beginning, given that I had little to no experience in either Women's, Gender, and Sexuality or Art History, it was also one of the classes in which I became the most engaged in. For our final project, I investigated the history of allegories in Western art and why they were so often portrayed as women.
SummerOff Campus
I interned at Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, MA under Dr. Livingston. I explored the mechanism by which BRCA1 acts as a tumor suppressor. It was really rewarding to be able to apply what I had learned in Biol13, including specific procedures and techniques we had been tested on, to a real-life laboratory setting.
This class is notorious for its difficulty, and I would not call it an easy class. Nonetheless, it was my favorite class because I loved Professor Jacobi, who has taught at Dartmouth for 22 years, and I appreciated learning mechanisms behind why certain reactions happen. Instead of rote memorization, this class relied on being able to predict the products of a reaction, a skill picked up from lots of practice.
Although this was an introductory class, Professor Craig made it more dynamic and interactive, with several visits to the Hood Museum of Art, ethnography labs, and weekly discussion posts. I learned about everything from the Gebusi culture and their rites of passage to the opioid epidemic. For my final paper, I conducted an ethnography studying the social dynamics that take place in Baker Lobby and how that relates to the exchange of capital.
Though I had taken four years of computer science before (mostly in middle school), I did not have a very good experience with coding prior to taking CS1. However, the professor was one of the best professors I have had, explaining jargon in understandable ways and even giving out chocolate bars to students who answered the most difficult questions she would ask in class. I was certain that there was no way I would be able to create the lab assignments (such as a revolving solar system animation and map of Dartmouth that calculated the shortest possible route between two points), but she enabled all of us to through exercises, short assignments, and exams.
I took this class for a distributive requirement and ended up loving it. Each student was assigned a day to present on a certain topic - mine being patriarchy. I decided to analyze relationships in Crazy Rich Asians through a lens of the patriarchal bargain. We explored transgender issues, the history of feminism, gender identity, and so much more. Would highly recommend!
As someone who didn't know the rules to pretty much any sport, I tentatively signed up for this class. However, the professors made it clear that everyone had a different sports background, so I never felt at a disadvantage. We used Markov chains to predict winners of tennis matches, analyzed field goals kicks using logit models, and listened to guest speakers from a variety of industries.
WinterOff Campus
I spent the winter at the Fogarty International Center of the National Institutes of Health, studying epidemiology and global health. I was first involved on a project using data surveillance and social media to model Ebola outbreaks in the DRC, but as soon as the COVID-19 outbreak started, I transitioned to that. I was even able to publish my first paper!
SpringOff Campus
I was planning to study in Rome for the term and practice my basic Italian skills, but unfortunately the program was canceled. Instead of taking classes, I decided to continue working at my winter internship at NIH. Some of the research I conducted involved analyzing data on excess mortality as a method of estimating the true burden of COVID-19.
For the spring, I decided to take three STEM courses – Cell Structure and Function (BIOL 12), General Physics (PHYS 4), and Introduction to Computer Science (COSC1). The most STEM classes I have taken before at the same time was two, during my freshman fall. I’m not going to lie; I was really worried about the combination of all of these difficult classes and managing the coursework for each. I did not have much of a choice in the matter because I decided to major in QSS relatively late (sophomore winter) and COSC1 is a prerequisite for the major as well as many upper-level QSS classes.
I promised myself I would study some computer science over the spring break, but once I got home to my cozy bed, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, baking, and napping seemed to take over my days. I ended up not preparing at all for any of my classes, leaving me anxious the few days before the term started.
In BIOL 12, we are occasionally presented with a longer, in-depth problem that we work out with our groupmates before going over as a larger class.
Although it is only week two right now, I have realized that though this term will no doubt be difficult, it will not be impossible or even any more taxing than any other terms. And that’s because of one thing that Dartmouth does so well – providing academic resources. I was shocked by just how many resources there are for my classes. For example, my biology class has a Learning Science Fellow who holds review sessions twice a week and is available five days a week from 9-5 to meet individually with us. Our professor has office hours twice a week, and I recently joined a study group that meets weekly, led by a student who excelled in the course. If I have a question, the dilemma isn’t usually in finding someone to ask, but rather choosing who to ask!
The same goes for physics and computer science – both have current students who are teaching assistants, graduate teaching assistants with review sessions and office hours, and of course, professors who are more than willing to answer questions during their own office hours, held multiple times a week. During our first computer science class, the professor mentioned that there is a total of 70 office hours offered every single week!
Faculty recognize that these STEM courses can be difficult, especially if you have limited prior knowledge of the material. As a result, they have implemented so many ways for students to succeed regardless of their starting point, as long as you have the initiative to take advantage of these resources.
I met these two friends through class assigned groups in my general chemistry and genetics classes back in freshman year. Ever since, we have studied together and see each other often due to shared classes. In fact, Saeed (right) is leading my BIOL 12 study group, which both I and Tyler (left) signed up for!
Furthermore, in my biology and physics classes, we work in small groups during class. Every few lecture slides, there is a question displayed on the board, either through the PollEverywhere app or old-school style, and we discuss it in our group before deciding on an answer. I think group work not only allows you to get to know the other students, thus giving you yet another form of support, but it also promotes active learning. Realizing how to study in such a way that uses active learning instead of passive learning was one of the biggest transitions I had to make from high school to college.
I’m actually looking forward to my classes because though they may be difficult, I’m genuinely interested in the topics and I feel that I have a lot of support available to me. To anyone who may be considering taking STEM classes at Dartmouth, have no fear! It just might be the best decision you make.
Right now, I'm taking a Writing 5 class called Food for Thought, focusing on environmental, agricultural, culinary, and nutritional aspects of the food we choose to eat.
Read all about my course selection for freshman fall! In order to mask my panic at the idea of it already being week 7 and having to once again choose classes, I decided to reflect on the classes I chose this term.
Now that we're all champing at the bit for the end of term, it's become coy and fleeting, tiptoeing further out of sight with each new assignment. And somewhere in waiting-for-finals I've found myself growing a little weary.
In BIOL 12, we are occasionally presented with a longer, in-depth problem that we work out with our groupmates before going over as a larger class. 
I met these two friends through class assigned groups in my general chemistry and genetics classes back in freshman year. Ever since, we have studied together and see each other often due to shared classes. In fact, Saeed (right) is leading my BIOL 12 study group, which both I and Tyler (left) signed up for!
