PROFILE:
David Creychology. While at CC, Dave was a member of the Honor Council, was a Writing Center Tutor, and a Varsity tennis player.

After he graduated, Dave began working with Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (the author of "Flow" and "Creativity" among other titles) at the Claremont Graduate University in Claremont, CA. He was brought in as a research assistant in the psychology lab to work on several of Csikszentmihalyi's research projects and to develop his own (all relating to Dave's interest in the psychology of performance and sport psychology). This research has been looking at the transmission of values and practices in several kinesthetic arts (Dave has been studying dance, martial arts, and coaching), primarily through interview data.

       Dave was just accepted into UCLA's doctoral program in social psychology (where he plans to attend in the Fall). It is a research-based program that has specializations in sport psychology and health psychology. He thinks that CC provided a good introduction to the field of psychology. Unlike most educational institutions in the country, you have the opportunity to take an area(s) that you are passionate about and run with it. What makes this so unique is that you are mentored by excellent professors, and you have essentially two months to do YOUR OWN RESEARCH and nothing else.

       Dave strongly advises psychology students to start your thesis the summer before the designated blocks, and to spend some time asking yourself what you really want to know, how you could test it in two months, and bounce these ideas off of your advisor. (4/30/01)

Elisa Kapler (Neuroscience)

    Elisa Kapler gradated magna cum laude from Colorado College with a degree in neuroscience in May of 2000.  Elisa was quite active while at CC, and was a member of the Women’s Leadership Training Institute, the Women in Science Alliance, the Women’s Softball team, and Club Med.  In addition to these organizations, Elisa was the recipient of numerous awards and grants, including the Arnold B. Scheibel Neuroscience Award,  the Howard Hughes Undergraduate Research Grant, and a Venture Grant to attend the Society for Neuroscience conference.

    Currently, Elisa is working at the National Institute of Mental Health in the Clinical Disorders Branch.  Her branch, which is headed up by Daniel Weinberger primarily does Schizophrenia research, but they also work on Parkinson’s Disease and Alzheimer’s Disease.  The branch is working on a developmental model of schizophrenia, and therefore has many different sections, including genetics, neuropathology, neuropsychology, molecular biology and several others.  Elisa works in the neuroimaging section of the branch, and her research utilizes a 3 Tesla Magnetic Resonance Scanner to acquire functional, structural, and spectroscopy data.  She focuses on magnetic resonance imaging; working with patients, running the scans, and analyzing the functional data acquired.  Elisa chose to work in this lab because it allowed her to work with patients in a research setting, which will help her prepare for her graduate work in an M.D./Ph.D. program.

    Elisa feels that her neuroscience degree from CC put her ahead of many other individuals in her position at the NIMH.  Most of the other people working in her lab have not had much neuroanatomy or physiology.  Elisa believes she is fortunate because her neuroscience degree gave her a solid background, thus allowing her to choose which lab she wanted to work for.  Elisa feels that the professors at CC are very supportive and are more than willing to help students.  She thinks that the block plan (that is, the block plan with challenging lab courses) is in some ways a good way to prepare for life in research.  Much like the block plan, you can expect to be working on, thinking about, or reading about your research just about all of the time!  Of course, it should go without saying that research doesn’t have block breaks, nor does it break for Friday nights, Sunday mornings, ect.

    Her advice to other students wishing to pursue a job in research or who are continuing on to graduate school is to first do some research at CC.  Elisa believes her research experience greatly helped her prepare for the projects she is working on currently.  Her research taught her how to think about a project, learn about it, and how to question results and processes.  Elisa highly recommends utilizing the professors and any others that are willing to help as much as possible.  They have been through the process and have some great advice. (4/30/01)

Sabina Mehta (Psychology, 2000)
    Sabina Mehta graduated from CC with a B.A. in Psychology in 2000. In 2004, Sabina completed her Master's degree in Speech and Hearing from the University of Minnesota. She works as an audiologist at Kaiser Permanente in Denver, CO. Sabina was featured at the Science News for Kids website on January 11, 2006...http://www.sciencenewsforkids.org/articles/20060111/Feature1.asp (see the "Scientist's Notebook" link).

    For students considering a speech-language-hearing graduate program, Sabina recommends taking some biology-based courses, statistics, and neuroscience courses at CC. These courses would serve as a great foundation for graduate school. She also recommends students call up hospitals and ask to spend a day or two observing audiologists and/or speech language pathologists at work to learn more about the career. She'd advise against taking more than one year off between undergraduate and graduate school. When the undergraduate major is in an area other than speech/language/hearing, the graduate program can be 3-4 years long, plus a residency year. It's quite a lengthy degree process. Finally, in terms of getting admitted to programs, she encourages students to take a class or two (and getting an A!) within the department of the particular graduate program they are interested in prior to applying to the graduate program. This way, one can ask the professor who taught the class to write a letter of recommendation for the particular graduate school application. If you're interested in the audiology area, Sabina would be happy to talk. Contact Sabina through CC Professor Cathey Weir (Cathey.Weir@coloradocollege.edu). (4/3/06