Activities and Awards: Summer Undergraduate Chemistry Researcher; Excellence in Organic Chemistry Award; Excellence in Biochemistry Award; Study Tables Chemistry and Biology Tutor; Organic and Biochemistry Teaching Assistant; Emerson and Ashton Student Ministry Coordinator; Learn and Serve Core Member; American Chemical Society Club President; Pre-Health Club Event Coordinator; Chess Club Treasurer; SPU Dental Society Treasurer; Korean Student Association Event Coordinator, President's Citation Award finalist
Hometown: Puyallup, Washington
What is something you wish everyone knew about your major? Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry is unequivocally the best major (in my unbiased opinion). Learning chemistry really opens up your eyes to how the world works at an atomic level. You begin to understand HOW and WHY everything happens, not just what happens. For example, we learned that the mitochondria is the "powerhouse of the cell," this tells us the role of the mitochondria, but how it achieves this "power" is a mystery. However, by using chemistry, we can start to understand the processes and mechanisms that drive the reactions in the mitochondria and how we are able to get energy out of sugar and food.
I think that learning biochemistry is also a very humbling major. As we understand how our enzymes and cells function, the infinite complexity of the human body becomes very apparent. There are literally hundreds of unique proteins in a mitochondria, thousands of mitochondrias in a single cell, and trillions of cells in a human body. This already is dizzying but keep in mind, cellular respiration is only one cellular process out of over a billion trillion reactions that happen per second every second we are alive (it is a miracle that we are even alive at all). I cannot even begin to wrap my brain around how this is all possible, I can only be in awe of how wonderfully and lovingly we were made by God.
What was your most impactful class or professor? The most impactful professor I have had (out of many great ones) was Dr. Minhee Lee. My very first class as a freshman was CHM1310, Survey of General Chemistry. This also happened to be my very first chemistry class, and coming out of high school as a less than stellar student, I was very nervous. But Dr. Lee taught chemistry using so many memorable and funny analogies that I immediately fell in love with the subject. I even ended up switching my major to biochemistry to take more chemistry classes. She has been so supportive of me even after I finished her class. I even performed research under her and worked as a TA for lab and tutor for her classes. She was such a great mentor, and I feel so much more prepared as I look forward to medical school and become a doctor.
What advice do you have for incoming students? There is a big leap in difficulty when comparing high school to college. The content is of course much more difficult, but in my opinion the biggest difference is the need for accountability and intrinsic motivation. There are so many things that you could do to coast through college and just get the grades and a degree (especially as AI just gets better and better). But in order to truly extract as much value from college as possible, it is important to go look beyond the grade. There is so much that you can learn from subjects that you love and even subjects that you don't think that you'll love. I think that college is the epitome of learning for learning's sake, just try to enjoy the ride and not get overwhelmed with the stress.
P.S.: Take advantage of the great resources, study tables, office hours, clubs, and more.