Class Of 2018 Profile

Joshua Forges has been inspired to make art ever since his second-grade teacher complimented his drawing of an alligator. She recommended that Forges attend art-focused magnet schools in his native Miami, and by high school, he was taking college-level classes and drawing, painting and sculpting up to four hours each day. Read More

Kelly Perry believes in the power of stories—writing them, collecting them and sharing them to strengthen community. Read More

As a high school student, Josh Fleck knew he wanted to research and develop robotic prosthetic devices. At Vanderbilt, the mechanical engineering major has spent the past three years in Assistant Professor Karl Zelik’s Biomechanics and Assistive Technology Lab immersing himself in research. Read More

Samantha Long, who is majoring in musical arts (voice) at Blair School of Music, came to Nashville with many interests, not certain if music would be her path. But after doing a bit of searching, she found that singing was still her passion. Read More

At age 12, Logan Brown decided she wanted to become a lawyer. So the pre-teen pursued and landed an internship at the Douglas County district attorney’s office in Lawrence, Kansas, giving her a front-row seat to the legal system at work. Read More

Since he was 13, Phillip McGloin’s world had orbited around basketball. He walked on to the Commodore basketball team as a freshman and played three seasons. But he chose to leave the team during his junior year to begin planning more seriously for his future. Read More

School of Engineering senior Christian Motyczka has found his passions in and out of the lab. He is one of two computer science undergraduates who developed a virtual reality program to help addicts stay clean. Read More

Sami Chiang was conducting experiments and using critical thinking long before she knew what those things were. The daughter of a school administrator and an engineer, the Berkeley, California, native’s life was immersed in experiential learning from the start. Read More

The only thing Briana Francois enjoys more than watching TV and digital content is creating it. Her double majors in psychology and cinema and media arts have allowed her both to examine human behavior and represent it authentically on film. Read More

Alexandra Doten’s passion for blending science, education and outreach was born from a failure. Doten took an astronomy class her first semester freshman year and failed the first test. But with encouragement from a professor, she turned the experience into a lesson in perseverance. Read More

As Jalen Dansby approaches Commencement, he has acceptance letters from 10 of the country’s top medical schools, including Yale and Vanderbilt. He’s motivated to become a doctor not just for himself, but also for his community. Read More

“Adventurous” is the word that best describes Sarah Robinson. The Blair School of Music student is unafraid of doing things she has never tried before and open to new cultural experiences. Read More

Elizabeth Lee identifies as many things. She’s a mechanical engineering major, a proud Asian American, and a woman working in the STEM fields. To give a clearer voice to these identities, Lee created a web comic called “Existing Quietly, Living Loudly.” Read More

Yalun Feng wants to look beyond science—to social solutions and entrepreneurship—to help solve problems affecting the environment. Read More