Potentials Reached through Research and Presenting

 Marina Abdalla, Verrazzano Class of 2022, completed major in Psychology and minor in Biology

One of my biggest accomplishments at the College of Staten Island was being a research assistant in a research lab. I was fortunate enough to participate in a Child Development research lab that is co-run by Dr. Sarah Berger and Dr. Lana Karasik. Without them, I would have not been granted the opportunity to work on my capstone project and work with children, even though it was virtually. My dream has been to work with children, whether it would be a doctor or something else in the medical/healthcare field. Being able to instruct parents to teach their infants how to safely descend stairs to avoid injury left a huge impact on my goal. Watching the infants’ ability to strategize and listen to their parents’ advice taught me how smart infants can be even though they are so young! I realized their motor potentials and problem-solving abilities when coding their behavior.

One thing I am not the best at is technology. When I started coding it was difficult because so many things were happening at once that I needed to focus on and note. On many occasions, the app crashed on me, which made me have to start a coding session over again as my hours of work were lost. Even though I had saved my work, it was still disappeared. Although it became exceedingly difficult for me to maintain my motivation to continue, it taught me how to work around the app and discover ways that could make coding much easier and consistent for me.

I am also not the best at presenting. I have the worst stage fright and I get extremely nervous. When I was able to talk to someone beforehand about the presentation, having the motivation and ambition to work on my fear put me in a better spot.

I have had the best experience with my advisors here at CSI that believed in me, when I myself could not. It also prepared me for possible presentations in the future, so for that I will forever be thankful to them for a wonderful time during my undergraduate experience.