Beyond the Classroom: The Class of 2024 Gains Real World Experience Through Senior Projects

For 55 years, Bryn Mawr’s soon-to-be graduates spend one week doing their Senior Projects: the only requirement is to do something that interests them. The goal is to give them experience in the real world; they might choose to spend that time in a potential future career field, or they might choose to spend that time doing something they find interesting or learning a new skill. 

The 86 members of the Class of 2024 had a wide variety for their senior projects. Some traveled to other countries and throughout the United States, and some stayed local in Baltimore or even designed their own projects. Bella Rosen ’24 spent her Senior Project with Bryn Mawr’s communications team and wrote this recap of a few of her classmates’ experiences. 

I am shadowing Dr. Lasner, a physical therapist at Johns Hopkins outpatient facility, who specializes in performing artists and athletes. I have observed the appointments of Dr. Lasner and her coworkers to learn what methods and technologies are used to solve problems like prolonged joint pain or instability. 

In summer of 2021, I was actually a patient of Dr. Lasner for an ankle injury. While working towards recovery, I learned a lot about my body, which is your instrument as a dancer. In order to sustain my dance career as long as possible, I knew it would be useful to learn more about solving problems within the body. 

My favorite part has been getting to meet so many new people, both patients and staff, and hear them tell their stories. One moment that sticks out is working with a child patient with cerebral palsy. She loves “Frozen” and “The Wizard of Oz” and insisted on listening to the soundtracks while doing treatment exercises. It was so fun to put on “Let It Go” and “Do You Want to Build a Snowman?” and see her sing her absolute heart out. Another moment was observing a patient use the Hydroworx, which is essentially a treadmill placed in a small chamber of water. It takes the pressure off the joints and can help patients regain weight-bearing strength and mobility in a particular area. It was such a cool and unique experience and brought a smile to the patient’s face because they love to swim. 

For many patients, particularly kids, it can be difficult to articulate the pain they are feeling and describe it to the medical professional. As a result, this can make it difficult to determine what is the source of pain, the best treatment plan, and its severity.  

To trust the process and know your path to recovery may not be linear. Several patients who practiced their exercises at home before their next session reported pain subsiding and strength increasing significantly. Although they may have felt discouraged in the beginning of treatment after an injury or surgery, each individual was able to maintain a safe recovery by investing time in their bodies. However, several clients also experienced symptoms returning after a few months or years. Although frustrating, it is important to trust the process and listen to your body’s needs.

Elizabeth with her supervisor, Dr. Andrea Lasner

I am shadowing my uncle, Dr. Arun Lakshmipathy, who is the Medical Director at Arizona Medical Group.

I am fascinated by science and the inner workings of the human body. I think medicine is the perfect combination of helping people in need and exploring interesting biological concepts. I was interested specifically in working with seniors because they are often underserved in medicine and have a unique set of needs that I was interested in understanding. 

The highlight has been seeing the range of work my uncle does and the different medical needs that seniors have.
 

A challenge has been dealing with sudden changes, like a patient getting worse unexpectedly, because everyone needs to react quickly. Also, balancing the family’s desires with what’s best for patients can be difficult because sometimes it doesn’t align. For example, if the family wants to take a patient home when they aren’t well enough yet.  

I’ve learned that medicine can be very demanding and requires a lot of knowledge, but it is also very rewarding and allows you to build strong relationships with patients and engage in meaningful work.

I am shadowing a Project Manager at NASA and completing an individual project on remote sensing and the commercial space sector. My project is hybrid, so on days when I’m virtually working I sit in on a variety of different meetings and work on completing my independent research. I am researching topics such as the Decadal Survey, types of Earth observation and their applications, the focus of future NASA Earth Science missions, and how the commercial sector can support government research and projects.

I’ve always wanted to know about how everything in the world works and why things behave the way that they do, so my love for science and physics in particular stemmed from that.

The entire experience has been a lot of fun, but I think the day that I was in-person was my favorite part. I loved getting to spend more time with my supervisor and get to know her better while also being exposed to everything that happens at Goddard’s campus. I also got to see the Roman Space Telescope in the clean room which was really cool!

It was a bit of a challenge getting used to all of the new language and acronyms that suddenly appeared everywhere. I feel like my first two days I was constantly looking up the meanings of new words, but it’s gotten better as I spend more time with them. 

I learned that it’s really important to take time and explore what you’re interested in. Before my senior project, I knew nothing about satellites or commercial space. Now, after taking the time to dive into these topics, I’ve discovered a new interest that I hope to continue learning about in the future. This experience has taught me to embrace exploration because you never know where it might lead you.

Sophia at Goddard’s clean room with the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope

My senior project is an independent writing project where I am working on two projects. One of which is rewriting a novella and another is creating a screenplay.

I have always been interested in creative writing because I really love reading and how good storytelling has the ability to connect people.
 

The highlight of my senior project so far has been just being able to dedicate time to writing and also getting advice from my supervisor. For me, there has been a huge difference between pondering about a story in my free time and actually working on it and treating it as work. 

 I think an unexpected challenge about this project for me and the field as a whole has been balancing working continuously and allowing for my creativity to flow naturally. I had never really faced writer’s block before this project, and now I have a better understanding of it and how to turn a creative outlet into a more serious project while still having fun. 

I have learned that the most important part of writing is to allow myself to really have fun with it, as well as receive feedback as much as possible. Initially, I tried to be as much as a professional writer as I could, but I realized that the purpose of writing for me is to have fun. The only way I could pursue a project in the field was to constantly keep that in mind, even when I treat the project as if I am a professional.