Why a black shark scientist decided to forge her own path outside of academia?

Maybe there's just another way to do science. Let me try that. It's Tuesday, July 23rd and you're listening to

Science Friday. I'm SciFi producer Shoshana Bucks Buxbaum.

Many kids dream of becoming a marine biologist when they grow up, but it's hard to make it a reality and even folks who commit fully to studying life in the sea face a lot of barriers to entry,

especially if they don't fit the long-standing mold of a white male marine biologist.

Jasmine Graham has an unparalleled passion for sharks, but a few years ago she started to feel that the

traditional path in academia wasn't designed for her to succeed. Here's guest host Rachel

Feldman. Instead of giving up she braved uncharted waters to forge a path of her

own and now she's bringing other young researchers of color along with her.

Jasmine Graham is the co-founder of Minorities in Shark Sciences or Miss, and author of Sharks Don't

Sink, Adventures of a Rogue Scientist.

Jasmine, welcome to Science Friday.

Hello, thanks for having me.

It is so exciting to chat with you.

I loved the book. You write about how you grew up fishing with your dad in South Carolina and I'm curious about how that led you to pursue marine biology.

Well I spent so much time out on the water. It really became sort of my place of peace and calm and where I could connect with the world.

And I fell in love with not only fishing,

but the ocean in general,

and I had a lot of questions.

Probably more questions than my dad would have liked, but I had a lot of questions about what was going on with the fish. Why were they here? Why are they more likely to be caught sometimes a year than others, all of these sorts of things.

And then when I was in the summer after 10th grade, I was able to attend this marine science camp at UNC Wilmington.

And that was the first time anyone ever said, hey, you can get paid to study fish.

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