About the Author

As I worked my way through public school, I had the good fortune of crossing paths with a number of teachers who encouraged my interests in both science and creative writing. Good grades and—I remain convinced—an original application essay won me admission to Oberlin College in 2010. Once there, I gave some serious thought to majoring in creative writing, but decided that a science degree was probably more responsible. And so, although I took as many writing courses as I could cram in, I graduated in 2014 with a Bachelor’s degree in biology.

Grad school wasn’t something that was ever really discussed in my family—merely assumed. Both my parents had graduate degrees, and I’d always been a “good” student—a Master’s or PhD was simply the next logical step. But before that, I decided, I’d spend a year or two working as a lab technician to gain experience (and money).

In practice, the only thing I really gained was the bone-deep knowledge that wet lab work was nor for me. After a string of unfulfilling jobs working in both academic and commercial biology labs, I found myself unemployed just as Covid-19 began to lock us all in our homes.

“Fine,” I said to myself. “If the government is going to pay me to stay home and write, that’s what I’m going to do.”  I succeeded at producing a pair of novels, but failed at finding an agent or publisher for them. But eventually, I had an epiphany: I liked science, I liked writing, and there was a whole field called “science writing.”  Talking about science, explaining complex concepts in simple language—those were things I could do, and maybe even do well.

That epiphany led me to the Johns Hopkins Masters in Science and Medical Writing program—and, hopefully, to a successful new career.