Background: B. Sc., University of California Santa Barbara
Completed the Biotechnology Certificate
Bioscience Internship: Marson Lab, UCSF
Current Career: Graduate Student, UCSF
Amy was hired directly out of her Bioscience Internship as a Staff Research Associate at the Marson Lab, UCSF. She is now completing her PhD at UCSF.
Amy has been an author on two science publication during her time in the Marson Lab:
I graduated from UCSB with a B.S. in Microbiology. During my last year of undergrad, I was uncertain about my career path. I’ve been told by many of my friends that I am a much happier person doing laboratory work, and my interest in doing research became more apparent to me when I got to take my upper division biology labs courses. During my last year of undergraduate studies, I took 5 biology labs and did fairly well in every single one of them because it is what interests me. As graduation drew near and I started looking for jobs back at home, the bay area, the job descriptions made me question myself about my capabilities of succeeding. I did not have much confidence in myself. I did not even have the confidence that I will land on any interviews because my skills did not match the job description/I did not have enough skills under my belt to be the perfect match/candidate. One of the main reasons why I felt unconfident was that I did not have enough experience, because I did not do any undergraduate research.
Even though some people may think that I have a degree, I have wet lab experience (in an academic setting, just classes), I should feel confident and will land on a job. But what I wanted was far more than just a job that pays. I wanted to work in a lab that suits my interests - drug development, immunology, immunotherapy, vaccine development, cardiovascular, oncology or anything along these lines. As I was job hunting, I was also looking into post-bachelor programs and other certification programs. I came across CCSF’s biotechnology program and I looked through the courses offered. I came across ELISA, protein purification, PCR, W. blot, and other methods that I’ve heard of in lecture classes and maybe get to prepare for and do in labs, but never really had a good understanding of each method. I came to realize that my 4 years of undergraduate research was very theoretical, and it did not provide enough hands-on or was detailed enough for me to fully understand why each step was performed in an experiment, making troubleshooting very challenging when unexpected results or problems arise.
Having no direction to go, I decided to take some of the biotechnology courses at CCSF. The first semester I took 5-6 biotechnology courses including ELISA, PCR, recombinant DNA, mammalian cell culture, protein purification. My first week at CCSF, I heard about the biosciences internship program and thought that it would be a great opportunity for me to give myself some exposure in doing research. Throughout the semester I became more familiar with laboratory techniques and acquired a better understanding of the different techniques used in labs and what outcomes I can get using each method and when is it appropriate to use the method. More importantly, I got to learn more about what the role of each reagent is for each method. I also took the career exploration class, a pre-requisite to the internship class, and through this class, I learned more about networking, about the different career paths that I can take, and some key things to keep in mind when looking for jobs, applying for jobs and doing interviews. Also, the faculty of the biotechnology program have lots of experience in biotech, whether it is in academia or in industry. They are there to support the students (be it people with a degree or people that want a career change). This is one of the advantages of the biotech program at CCSF, as students in the program, I was getting support from the faculty to really help me take my first step towards my career goal.
Upon completion of my first semester at CCSF, I started looking for labs to intern at. With the support of Karen, one of the internship program coordinators, I found a few labs that interested me and I got an opportunity to intern at the Marson lab at UCSF. During my internship, I was asked lots of questions by my mentor about the experiments and the steps of the procedure. Some questions I was able to answer and some I was not. For the almost 90% questions that I answered correctly, I would not have answered them correctly if it wasn’t for the classes I took at CCSF. The classes at CCSF really helped me become more prepared to work in a lab and boosted my confidence while I interviewed at different places for a potential internship because, from these classes, I became more knowledgeable of the techniques that I claim to be skilled at on my resume.
I recently landed on a Staff Research Associate position in the Marson lab to help my mentor with his projects. I do not think I will be able to land on a close to perfect job, in regards to where my interest lies, without going through the biotechnology program at CCSF. It brought me further down my career path and helped me put my foot into the door into the world of biotechnology.
