Sullivan, who hails from Wilmette, Ill., has juggled a number of activities during her Amherst career, including participation in the Newman club, women's chorus and the biology department's "3 + 4" committee, which is a student-faculty committee that meets to discuss department issues such as the hiring of new faculty members. She joined the committee during the faculty search in the spring of her junior year and continued on in the committee through her senior year. "I have enjoyed working with this group because it has given me an opportunity to interact closely with professors and impact the department in important ways," she said.
Sullivan also rowed on the crew team for all four years, being nominated as one of the co-captains, along with fellow classmate Emma Trask '02, for her senior year. She started rowing in the second semester of her freshman year and fell in love with it. "It's something that's become very addictive," said Sullivan. It takes up a lot of her free time due to the fact that there are at least three hours of practice every day in addition to weekend meets," she said. Nonetheless, she believes it is time well spent. "I like going out [to practice] every afternoon," said Sullivan. "It's something totally different, a nice stress relief."
Sullivan credits her teammates and coach as the people who make rowing such a pleasurable experience. "All the people on my team are great," said Sullivan. "And Coach Stekl is tremendous." As a captain this year, she has been able to add more to the team, keeping the team together, focused and coordinated. "It's rewarding and a lot of fun," said Sullivan.
The team's win in the Avaya National Championships last weekend made a perfect ending to Sullivan's crew experience at Amherst. They took second place at the New England 4's and third at New Englands earlier in the season. The boat that won gold this past weekend consisted of Laura Horn '02, Erin Krikham '04, Sullivan, Trask and Jesse Clavin '02 as coxswain. "It was great, we had a large team this year and everybody pushed and worked together to make it fast. It took everyone to do that," said Sullivan. "For most of the people in the boat, it was four years of hard work that paid off for a great season and a great final race."
From the first time she stepped on campus during accepted students' weekend, Sullivan knew Amherst was where she would spend the next four years of her life. "The reason that I picked Amherst was my favorite thing about it-the students," said Sullivan. "I visited and felt comfortable with the students." Her love of the students corresponded with that of the faculty: "I love the contact with professors, that you can always see them, and they're always willing to talk to you," she said.
When Sullivan first came to Amherst, she considered double majoring in biology and history, but also debated between chemistry or anthropology. She finally decided to major in biology and just take history classes as a non-major. As a biology major, she wrote her thesis with Professor Caroline Goutte of ____, who specializes in genetics, on "The Role of APH-1 in the Notch Signaling Pathway of C. elegans," which concerned cell biology.
"In my thesis I was trying to figure out the role that a particular protein (APH-1) played in a cell signaling pathway," said Sullivan.
There are only 11 Churchill Scholarships given every year, and Sullivan garnered one of them. The scholarship is specifically for American scientists who wish to study in Cambridge at Churchill College for a year. They can choose to work in engineering, mathematics or science. Each participant chooses a professor to be their own advisor to work with them in different programs. Sullivan was unsure about her chances at acceptance. "It's really competitive so I didn't really think that I had a chance," she said.
Sullivan applied for a M. Phil. program, which is a British masters program, in biochemistry. To obtain this degree, she will be doing a one-year research project cumulating in a thesis. "I imagine that [the thesis] will be similar in scope (though slightly larger) than my senior thesis here," said Sullivan. The whole program begins in October and lasts for 11 months. Her thesis will be on neurotransmitters.
Sullivan has some tentative plans as to what she will do after her year abroad. "After my year in England I plan to return to the U.S. and attend graduate school in biology," she said. "I hope to get a Ph.D. and either wind up eventually doing research or research and teaching." Sullivan has enjoyed her teaching experiences thus far. Sullivan has worked as a teaching assistant at Amherst as well as done some teaching and tutoring in high school in the mathematics and science subjects. But no matter what she ends up doing, it is certain that she will continue with the determination and effort that she demonstrated during her years at Amherst.