… I was able to simultaneously nourish my mind in the two disciplines that I wanted to commit to. The courses I have chosen to take will adequately prepare me for further education programming.
Psychology Methods and Statistics I and II – Fall 2019 and Spring 2020
Taking this two semester sequence course as a sophomore is unusual. Since I placed out of Introduction to Psychology, I was able to get a head-start in the Psychology Major curriculum. This course series adequately set apart the psychology students who took their major seriously and those who did not. The challenging course was fast paced with limited room for error because in order a student to be successful and proceed forward in the major, they have to have a “C” grade or above in the final grade. The second half of the second part of this course was taught completely online as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Our course schedule was very demanding every week prior to the pandemic and did not change after the pandemic, therefore I had to maintain a strict schedule to ensure that I did not miss any assignment or lecture.
This course taught me how to understand the basic research practices and ethical standards. This course also taught me how do a variety of statistical analyses such as z-tests, t-tests, Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and chi-squared analyses to name a few.
We were intended to do an actual experiment in the second part of the course series, however the pandemic inhibited our research. My groups research was going to be on a college student’s perception of social competence of another student suffering with a mental illness. The perceptions were based on the type of treatment the student with a mental illness was receiving as well as the method of communication towards the participating college student. The final product would have consisted of the whole manuscript of the experiment. Now, I only have drafted the introduction section of the manuscript as part of the research process.
RNA Biology – Spring 2020
This course is unique because not many college or universities actually offer this course. Since RNA Biology is a a newer topic, a college course dedicated to it is very rare. This course was taught by an immensely talented PhD candidate from Johns Hopkins University. I did not initially intend to take this course because I was overloaded on credits, but I am grateful that I did because this was the first time I interacted with, analyzed and synthesized scientific papers.
There were three projects that I completed for this course that were most memorable: the Journal Club Presentations, the RNA Disease Paper and the RNA Disease presentation.
The research for the journal club presentation was preparing for my final Disease paper and presentation assignment. This assignment provided the space and opportunity to research a condition that my family and I have been encountering over generations. Palmoplantar Keratoderma or PPK for short is a hereditary condition that is either inherited or acquired. There is evidence of diffuse PPK in the women of my family. PPK is characterized as the thickening of the skin on the palms of the hands and the soles of the feet. I had be teased and bullied about the way that my hands felt and I never understood why they were different. I learned to love my hands because they were evidence of my family’s past and how far we have made it since then.
After doing this assignment, I discovered that a mutation in a mitochondrial gene that encodes tRNA precursors was present in cases of PPK. I was astonished to have discovered this because mitochondria are inherited by the female egg and not the male sperm which explains why the women in my family are those who are affected. After almost 20 year of being clueless of why I had different hands, I was able to share the wealth of knowledge with my family. I felt so accomplished that during the COVID-19 pandemic when I was doing this research that I was able to scientifically make sense of a personal experience. This inspired what I wanted with my capstone for my Biomedical Science program. I grew as a researcher and as an academic. This project required dedication and focus on the process. I was lost reading the research papers and trying to make the connections. The more I struggled, the more I started to understand. In the end, I earned perfect marks on both parts of the assignment. My professor saw the passion and focus I put into the assignment.
General Chemistry I and II with Lab – Fall 2019 and Spring 2020
Not only was this course a requirement for my Biomedical Sciences Major and Pre-Med program, but it was one of the basic courses that I needed. This course was rewarding to me for three reasons. First, I was able to answer many questions about the work and satisfy my curiosity. Second, I was able to apply what I had learned in the classroom in the laboratory setting for the first time. Lastly, this class was reward to me because it was the first time I was able to compose an “official” Chemistry lab report as well as preform laboratory techniques that I have only learned about in books.
Being in the lab was one of the best academic experiences because I felt like I was in an environment where I belonged and I could be hands-on.
The Lab report was part of a practicum grade created by Lab professor. We did the lab report for Lab Three: Soap Lab. The procedure itself was a mess and so was the first draft of our lab report. Luckily, there was a week meant for drafting the lab report and one for revising. The draft paper severely disappointed our Lab instructor. Looking back, turning in the draft in its original form was embarrassing. For personal reasons, I had neglected applying my greatest efforts in the draft, therefore I had to ensure that the final was my best work.
Developmental Psychology – Fall 2018
This was the first psychology course that I took at McDaniel with my current advisor. Studying the material in her course pointed me in the direction of working with children and adolescents.
I was able to learn about different perspectives of theories of development such as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of development and Piaget’s four stages of cognitive development.
I enjoyed how interactive or professor made the course. She brought in her own children to play games with us to study cognitive development as well as took us on an approved field trip to the local court house to watch juvenile cases. Her course encouraged me to dive deeper into the Psychology major and take the chance to study it even though my family strongly advised not to.
One of the main assignments for this course was a report on the case studies that we saw in court earlier in the semester. This was the first time my observation and application skills were put to the test. I had to go through many revisions of the assignments prior to submission. The process from actually visualizing the case studies, taking detailed notes, setting the stage in the paper without images to applying theories and concepts from the class was long and challenging, but I was able to triumph through and also earn high marks.
Elva Joya's ePortfolio 