Success for senior Shewit Tekeste was inspired by African upbringing and fostered at UCSC
At UCSC, Senior Shewit Tekeste has a fascination for biology and a commitment to biomedical research. This fall will begin a graduate school at UCLA Graduate School for Biomedical Research. But their interests and their passion for learning have their roots in Kenya, where they were born and raised.
“My passion for the promotion of knowledge with me gradually grown, from my experience at first hand to see family and close relatives die slowly of AIDS and see homeless children suffer from malnutrition, wander aimlessly around heaps of garbage to dig for food,” said Tekeste.
“In Africa, many believe that these diseases are a curse, not überhört, for sinners who do not reside in accordance with the traditional way of life,” she said. “This will give recognition ways to prevent and treat such diseases. It provides a brake on the research on the prevention or treatment.”
Tekeste’s family was originally from Eritrea, but unrest there obliged to seek refuge in Kenya. She was born in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, where the family lived until five years ago, when they are in the United States. Tekeste the family of eight - she has a sister and four disturbs - joined her uncle in San Diego, where he helped them.
“We stayed with him and his family in their two-room apartment - 12 people collectively - for a month before my family moved into a two-room apartment,” she said.
As a 17-year-old, Tekeste found equality with the U.S. culture difficult. “But I learned to use barriers as positive challenges that test my stamina and use pressure as my driving force,” she said.
Tekeste said her firm determination for the academic success stems from their upbringing. “I was raised that the adoption, unless you recognize where you come, you will never know where you go,” she said.
Tekeste is the first of her family to graduate high school and the first at a university. It has clearly made the most of the opportunities she found at UCSC, including the possibility to work in a faculty research laboratory.
Tekeste was in the laboratory by Melissa Jurica, assistant professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology. It was supported by UCSC minority access to research career (Marc) program and, more recently, a variety Award for Undergraduate Research in Genomic Sciences, the Center for Biomolecular Science & Engineering (CBSE).