First-Gen Scientist Lands Coveted UCLA Internship

Alice Chamberlin will be spending her summer in Los Angeles, but rather than soaking up sunshine, the Eastern Washington University senior will be working and learning in a prestigious biochemistry research lab at University of California Los Angeles.

Chamberlin, a first-generation college student who is due to graduate next year, has spent much of her life in the Spokane and Moses Lake areas with her parents and two younger sisters.

“I’ve always loved science; I wanted to be a geologist when I was about eight,” Chamberlin says. “I had a lot of emotional-support science books.”

Chamberlin, previously a Running Start student, attended Big Bend Community College, in Moses Lake, with the aim of focusing on biology and transferring to a four-year university. However, a few scheduling conflicts prevented her from beginning her general biology courses, so she chose to get her chemistry courses out of the way first. That’s when she discovered a passion for the minutia of chemistry.

“In biology, you talk about why cells do this and why cells do that, and I’m like, well we’re already at the molecular level, why don’t we just talk about the atoms that are doing this stuff?” Chamberlin says. “But I also enjoy biological systems. I think life is just mind-bogglingly fascinating. I felt like the intersection between those two is an area that I’d really enjoy.”

Chamberlin says she chose to attend Eastern Washington University because it has smaller class sizes, and a degree is more financially attainable than at other universities. She wanted to know all her professors and peers, integrate herself into the community and build skills and knowledge.

“I felt like Eastern could be exactly that, and it could be a really good jumping-off point,” she says.

Last spring, Chamberlin was accepted into the federally-funded TRIO Ronald E. McNair Post-baccalaureate Achievement Program. McNair scholars are first-generation and low-income sophomores and juniors, from underrepresented groups, or both. The program familiarizes students with academic research and prepares them for PhD programs.

Cori Jaeger, McNair Academic Advisor at Eastern, encouraged Chamberlin to apply to summer internships in biochemistry.

Last year, Chamberlin was accepted to Pennsylvania State University’s Summer Research Opportunities Program, operated by the Big Ten Academic Alliance universities to boost graduate studies and research careers among underrepresented student populations.

“I don’t think I would have been aware of any of the opportunities if McNair hadn’t helped me find them,” Chamberlin says. “It’s hard to know about that type of stuff. There’s a lot of information out there, and it can be a really daunting task.”

The McNair program also helped Chamberlin become an Amgen Scholar at UCLA this summer. She was one of 10 selected, out of hundreds who applied for the opportunity.

EWU assistant professor Ben Lundgren, PhD., is familiar with the work of prominent biochemical researcher and UCLA professor Yi Tang, PhD; Lundgren suggested that Chamberlin seek an internship spot in Tang’s lab.

While Chamberlin doesn’t yet know what her project at UCLA will entail, Tang’s specialty is natural product synthesis.

“Essentially, it’s difficult to synthesize things that exist inside of the body, so there’s a lot of research around that,” Chamberlin says.

In addition to working about 40 hours a week with Tang’s PhD and postdoctoral researchers, Chamberlin will also attend professional seminars and conferences and will write and present a research article as part of the Amgen program.

Chamberlin is eager to find her niche within biochemistry and become an authority in the field.

“I would really like to get to the point where I’m manning my own project — I have all these ideas. I’m doing my own independent research with the help of everybody in a lab. I’m working on a project that I’m really invested and interested in for a long time,” she says.

Her dream is to teach and do research at the university level.

“I’ve had so many great professors in my life. I’d really like to be that for somebody else,” Chamberlin says. “Especially now that there are so many more women going into science … sometimes seeing a woman doing the thing that you want to do in the way that you want to do it is just a really big encouragement.”

Chamberlin’s family is following her example. Both her parents left college without completing a degree program. Her mother, a behavioral specialist, is now working on a dual bachelor’s degree, with a plan to earn her master’s degree. Chamberlin’s father, who primarily is a stay-at-home parent, is also returning to his higher education career through a few online classes. Her younger sister is following in Chamberlin’s footsteps through the Running Start program.

“It’s really special,” Chamberlin says of her family’s ascent into academic success.