Meeting the members of the fellowship and more specifically my cohort has been such a fun and exciting opportunity. It has given me the chance to start learning about so many other fields and projects. From the other Brackenridge recipients, I hope to learn how to better communicate with my peers, especially those outside of my field. Likewise, I hope to learn good networking skills and just more about my peers in the Honors College in general. The Brackenridge fellowship recipients cover such a wide range of topics and also spans so many areas of the University in general. Therefore, I’m excited to learn other points of views, methodologies, and perspectives.

In my cohort, all of our projects are very different and each cover a distinct topic, which is very exciting. In our research, we cover math, neuroscience, history, Spanish, and biology, along with a range of other smaller fields. It’ll be so intriguing to learn more about everyone’s projects over the course of the semester and to also find how our fields and different focuses overlap. For example, Richa’s research looks into data production and historical epidemiological and government reports. Although my project focuses on Latin American literature, we’re both using archival documents in our research methods. Similarly, Megan G. is also doing a historical analysis, like Richa and I, although her focus is on biological information. Ella and Kaylee are focusing on topics a bit more theoretical, and it’ll be very exciting to see how we all progress in each area of study. 

Some of the benefits of working with people across disciplines is hearing different opinions and methods of research. Although our fields are extremely different, we all have the same goal of completing our research to expand knowledge and grow our respective fields. Working together will give us the chance to share our experience and expertise. However, some of the obstacles will be communicating our research to each other despite not having the same background knowledge in each field. Since we all have different focuses, some of the research isn’t always easy to understand, especially coming into this as a non-STEM major. For example, Kaylee’s research is so interesting but I don’t really understand most of the concepts and abstract algebra. Working together will all help us grow, as we will learn to better share our research with a wider audience outside of our field. I can’t wait to watch us all excel over the course of the summer!