Home Institution: Olin College
Research Project: Quantum Computing with Trapped Ions
UW Mentor(s): Boris Blinov

Q: What are your physics/science interests?
A: I have really enjoyed my classes in quantum mechanics and E&M. I'm very interested in atomic physics.

Q: What are your other interests?
A: I love to bake (anything) and to decorate cakes. I also really enjoy doing community service and believe that it is important to help those less fortunate than myself. In addition, I really enjoy teaching. I do a lot of K-12 outreach, working in classrooms and afterschool programs to get kids excited about science and engineering.

Q: What would you like to do after college?
A: I want to be a high school physics teacher.

Q: Tell us one strange but interesting fact about yourself.
A: Two years ago, I took classes in Budapest over the summer. While I was there, I was living in an apartment downtown which turned out, completely by accident, to be in the same exact building my grandfather had lived in after World War II.

Q: What first sparked your interest in Physics?
A: I first took a Physics class when I was in tenth grade and I immediately loved it. I started seeing Physics everywhere I looked as the explanation for why the things around me worked the way they did, and I was completely hooked.

Q: If you could have any pet what would it be?
A: A porcupine.

Q: If you had a free month and unlimited funds, how would you spend your time?
A: I would start a bakery and get my friends from college to join me. It would be open 24-7.

Q: If you could get a grant to study anything what would it be?
A: I plan to become a high school teacher, and I am very interested in the areas of student motivation and self-direction. If I had a grant I would want to study how students respond to learning environments in which they are expected to be self-directed and how those responses evolve over time as students become more comfortable with self-directed learning.