Contributing as a first-year student

Kesshni Bhasiin’s describes taking Ken Colodner’s Introduction to Neuroscience and Behavior in her first semester at Mount Holyoke as an incredible experience that changed her life. 

“Professor Colodner’s passion, how excited he was teaching that class, made me excited and want to learn,” she says. So in her second semester, she asked if she could work in his lab. 

“He said, ‘Definitely.’ No hesitation,” says Bhasiin, now a junior. “That was really nice because I had that mindset of, ‘I'm just a first-year, I don't know how much I can contribute.’” 

Describing her lab experience as “transformative,” she says that it has inspired her to add a doctorate in neuroscience to her post-college plans, in addition to a medical degree. 

“I’m a lot more comfortable with questioning, with actually understanding who I am as a person,” she says. “Not just having hard conversations with other people, but with myself, like, is this what I want to do? Why am I doing that? What is the next step, and am I walking in the right direction? I don't think I would have had the courage to have a lot of scientific — and even personal and professional — conversations two years ago, the way I do now. Just the experiences in the classroom, being able to do research, being able to study neuroscience.”