Out on my Own: Stories about going away from home
The Story Collider
Story Collider, Inc.
4.4 • 824 Ratings
🗓️ 3 July 2020
⏱️ 35 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week we present two stories from people who found adventure when on their own.
Part 1: Shawn Hercules is a successful gospel radio deejay in Barbados, but he dreams of a different kind of life in science.
Part 2: Emma Young feels ready for her first real job in science, surveying northern spotted owls, until she encounters some unexpected fears.
Shawn Hercules is currently a Biology Ph.D. candidate at McMaster University. He investigates the epidemiology and genetics of an aggressive form of breast cancer disproportionately affecting women of African ancestry. After moving to Canada from the island of Barbados, Shawn quickly got involved with Let’s Talk Science and communicating science via social media (@shawnhercules) and most recently co-produced and participated in the first ever "Science is a Drag” show presenting science in drag!
Emma Young is a Knauss Marine Policy Fellow with the US Fish and Wildlife Service in Washington, DC. She moonlights as a PhD candidate and science communicator at the University of Missouri - Saint Louis, where she studies avian malaria. She enjoys hoarding plants and shouting about how much she loves science, and she is the founder of Science Distilled, a bi-monthly science happy hour in St. Louis. She tweets @emyoung90.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | A science story, huh? |
| 0:05.3 | Is NYU a scientist? |
| 0:06.8 | I felt. |
| 0:08.0 | I was really strong. |
| 0:09.1 | And I just thought, well. |
| 0:10.0 | I figured it out. |
| 0:10.8 | It was that golden moment. |
| 0:13.3 | Because science was on my side. |
| 0:25.7 | Hello. Hello everyone. |
| 0:31.0 | Welcome to the Story Collider, where we present true personal stories about science. |
| 0:36.8 | I am your host, Liz Neely, and this week we're presenting stories about independence. |
| 0:40.5 | Welcome to our episode, Out on My Own. |
| 0:50.1 | So this weekend in the U.S., we are marking 244 years since the United States ratified the Declaration of Independence. |
| 1:01.6 | I was just rereading that document, and the first sentence states that people who are seeking to dissolve political bonds should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. |
| 1:05.1 | In other words, they need to tell their stories. |
| 1:12.8 | And then the second sentence, which is one of the best known in the world, assigns to each of us certain unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And our storytellers today |
| 1:20.5 | have a lot to share from their journeys and respective pursuits of those things. So let's get to it. |
| 1:29.3 | Our first story is from Sean Hercules. |
| 1:37.0 | It was recorded in October 2019 at the Burdock Brewery in Toronto, Ontario. The theme of that night was Lessons Learned. So I'm living in Barbados, You know where Rihanna's from? We actually went to high school |
| 1:49.9 | together. Fun fact. Anyways, I am fresh out of undergrad and I'm wondering about what my next steps are. |
| 1:57.5 | Will I go into medicine? Will I stay in science? Like, what are my next steps? Can I do |
| 2:03.0 | both? And I'm just wondering about all of these things. So I just take a break from studying and I |
... |
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