Women from around the state gathered on October 7th for the Annual Women in Science Scholars Meeting in Chapel Hill. Sponsored by the North Carolina GlaxoSmithKline Foundation, the annual meeting offers professional development for Women in Science Scholars. Thanks to endowed foundation grants, scholars are selected from thirty universities, including UNC Pembroke. The 2024-2025 scholarship recipients from UNCP are Biology major Dina Abumohsen and Chemistry major MyKayla Greene. Kinsley Adams, who is Lab Manager of the Alzheimer’s Disease Research Lab (or “Ben Bahr Lab”), accompanied UNCP scholars to the meeting. Wanda E. Hill, RPh, JD, was the guest speaker, and her talk was entitled, “Embracing Challenges as Growth Opportunities in Your Career Journey.” The nearly day-long meeting included both networking opportunities and representatives on hand from graduate programs. Dina, MyKayla, and Kinsley were asked to share their reflections on the meeting:
Dina Abumohsen
We both had an incredible time at the Glaxo Women in Science meeting! It was not only empowering but also a pleasure to see women who play such significant roles in STEM guiding us. We were fortunate to have numerous speakers share their struggles and lessons learned as women in science. They also offered general life advice, focusing on our success, such as being open to changing our career paths and finding our passion no matter where you are in life.
As both Mykayla and I aspire to pursue careers in STEM, this experience will be cherished and remembered for years to come. We were accompanied by Kinsley Adams, who made the experience even more enjoyable by being another aspiring woman in STEM.
MyKayla Greene
The meeting was wonderful. We were warmly welcomed by fellow GSK Women in Science and the speakers. The meeting was very informative on several career paths and how to navigate your career and your personal life. One of the speakers took us on the journey of her career, the many turns, expected and unexpected, that it took, and how she dealt with these changes. It was really insightful and helpful to me since I have always struggled with finding a career that is the right fit for me. She made me realize that it’s okay not to always have everything together and that our paths may change. We just need to embrace the change and go for what we want. This is our life!
I will be graduating in Spring 2025, and while I am unsure of how to get there, my goal is to become a functional medicine practitioner to aid in the healing and prevention of disease.
Kinsley Nicole Adams
I liked how they really pushed us young women to step outside our comfort zones, starting with meeting new people there at the event, all the way to moving out of your comfort zone in the workplace.
Something that really stuck to me was that connections are crucial to your success. The majority spoke about how important it was to make foundational connections within your workspace and gave ways to make connections at events, seminars, etc. One speaker in particular gave her story about how she's worked with the same company on three separate occasions. She accredited her connections with the people there to how she was able to be hired by the same company multiple times.
A piece of advice I would give would be to always find a way to grow your bubble of knowledge. STEM is a vast field, and there is so much to learn within each sub-field. I would advise attending conferences, workshops, seminars, and even taking one of the many free courses that's provided online. All of these are avenues that can help you grow as a scientist and can make you stand out against the rest when applying for jobs, schools, etc. These are also ways to grow connections, which can be crucial for your next steps.
My career goals are to become a Naturopathic Doctor, with the emphasis on nutrition. My goal for obtaining this degree is help improve the quality of life for my community through nutrition and natural medicine.
Web managers note: Dina and MyKayla have been actively engaged in research while earning excellent grades in the classroom. Mentored by Dr. Sivanadane ("Siva") Mandjiny, Dina’s research questions have been based in chemistry, while MyKayla has investigated dementia as part of a research team in the Bahr Lab. Prior to joining the Bahr Lab as manager, Kinsley earn a BS in Biology from UNCP (Class of 2023) while conducting research with Biology professors and with the Bahr Lab.
