Post Spring Break Syndrome

Welcome back from Spring break! I was busying cleaning my room and reorganizing my closet. I missed school and being in the lab. I also missed my blog post accidentally and didn't remember it the entire week until I was on my way to school this morning.

So the week before Spring Break was the research conference at ASU! First off, I was semi-intimidated (which I don't tend to be for the most part) because of the other students' research but realized that it was my first conference and it was learning experience for many of us. Once I got registered and ready, I met up with the other lab interns where we had breakfast and distributed our posters. Everyone helped one another to post our posters up. After a brief introduction, the under-grad students were directed back to their posters. I got the opportunity to speak with other students in my area to learn more about where they're from and what their academic and career goals are. There was a guy from Tucson, another guy from New Mexico and a woman from  Puerto Rico! It was interesting to see the diversity in science as I myself are a minority. I only had one judge ask me about my experiment and I was able to answer all the questions! :) I know a couple other interns had more than one judge. After presenting, we had lunch and listened to a few presentations given by various ASU professors who spoke about their experience to get to where they are as well as the importance of attending graduate school and beyond. It was nice to see someone I can relate to. One of the professors grew up in New York, went through the struggle of being an inner-city kid and overcame that through education and persistence. Inspirational to say the least.

My poster posted up :D I was so proud of myself.

This is the mars explorer replica that a group and I got a chance to check out at the ASU School of Earth and Space Exploration along with other cool events that took place. This event happens the first Saturday of March if you're interested in going in upcoming years. 

On Wednesday, STEM hosted an outdoor event for 5th-graders where we taught them how to make paper rockets and had a launching competition between the groups. The kids really seemed to enjoy it and it was fun working with children! 

On another note, if you didn't know already, I got offered a summer internship at University of Massachusetts, Amherst. I was extremely exited to find this out but unfortunately this last Saturday, I found out that the program had to get cancelled because of lack of funding etc. I was really sad but thought to myself that it was an honor to get offered in the first place and hopefully I get offered something similar. I applied to 7 internships in total so I still have yet to hear back from the other 6 so I'm looking forward to that!

On a happier note however, I had a good spring break and am back to school refreshed and ready to tackle the second half of the semester! It's good to be back in the lab and look forward to updating you all on the shenanigans of being a lab intern :)

Have a fabulous week,
Khadidja M.


Surprise Photo of the Week:

My nephew Zakaria was born on Pi Day at 12:46 am :) YAY!