Finding Your Footing
Name: Aviva Rossi, MS, PhD
Profession: Wildlife Ecologist
Title (s): Scientist, Professor, Research Director, Soccer Mom
I haven't actually ever had anyone ask me for my high school GPA. I knew that I was going to go to community college after high school, simply for financial considerations. If memory serves, I started taking classes at the local community college at 14 years old. I took a class in Orienteering and Navigation with my Mom, just for fun. Then I had to take a class there my senior year of high school to get enough units to graduate, because I had failed too many in high school. Looking back, I'm not even entirely sure I fully recognized the difference between a community college and a 4-year college/university at the time. I picked a college that was in a beautiful area, somewhere around a lot of nature where I would want to live, and went there. It was Feather River College in Quincy, California. Although many people in my extended family have higher ed degrees, and my parents had taken college classes, neither of my parents had degrees, and those in my immediate circle growing up did not have them either. In hindsight, I entered into the world of higher education a bit blind to the process.
Although I had started out strong in elementary school, and was in advanced programs then, that fell apart by middle school and high school. I recently requested my high school transcripts, the first time I had needed them in 25 years, just to confirm what I vaguely remembered. My GPA was ~2.4, and I failed both math and biology in high school. I had some challenges at home, and my focus was really not on my studies. One delightful high school teacher even told the class I was the kind of person who wouldn’t accomplish anything in life. I had started working when I was around 14 years old, and I always had some sort of work for my own income after that, and my focus was on work and my social life. I do not regret any time that I ever spent just experiencing life for what was there in front of me at that time, but it does mean that I was not dedicating the time to school that doing well requires.
That being said, I have known since I was 12-years old that I wanted to be a Wildlife Biologist. I wanted a science career. I was in 5/6th grade, in Mr. Fisher's classroom, showing him some of the shells I had collected and labeled. He pointed to a poster on the wall about being a biologist, and said "you know there is a job where you can do this for a living". I remember on that poster there was a picture of a fox, and I had this image of myself walking through a sunny field watching a fox as it trotted by through the grass in front of me. And I was sold. That was my goal. Even though I considered other careers over the years, and oscillated between majors because of that, being a Wildlife Biologist was the only one that ever really inspired me to do the work it takes to build a career.
When I first started taking classes at the college, I didn't do well in those either. I hadn't developed the study skills I would need to do well in college classes. Some students develop those in high school, and I had not done that. It took me a a year or so at the community college to fully get my footing, and learn how to study to do well at the college level, particularly in STEM courses. Now that I have been teaching at the University for a decade, I have seen so many students do poorly at their first college-level science course, even students who excelled in high school, and say things like "I am just not good at science" or "I guess I'm not as smart as I thought I was". It has nothing to do with that! You are capable of this. It's all about learning how to study for the expectations for where you are at that time. And if you are pushing yourself, and growing, you will need to be raising the expectations for yourself, and learning how to meet those higher goals at many steps in your path. There are times where you will falter because you are pushing yourself, and that's ok! I did find my footing academically after attending 3 community colleges - choosing each one because it was in a beautiful place that I wanted to live. I then transferred to the University of California (UC), Santa Cruz. My grades were better there, because I was ready for it by the time I attended - and I graduated with honors. Humorously, at the time I attended UC Santa Cruz didn't even give grades by default, you had to request them, otherwise you would just get a written narrative of your performance. I didn't request grades for enough of my classes, so I do not have a GPA from my undergraduate institution at all. Not having one has often been more of a challenge than having a lower one!
I started doing internships, and working as a field assistant, during my time at UC Santa Cruz. Those experiences are crucial to building your career. I never needed my undergraduate GPA to find work, but having those work experiences from the internships opened the door to other jobs, which got me more experience. Getting work experience in your chosen field is also the only way to know if it is something you truly enjoy doing. If the work is what you envisioned. There are plenty of people who don't get work experience in their field until after graduation, only to find out it's not something they really like doing. Working in a given profession is often much different than studying it.
I did find that not having a GPA from my undergraduate institution made it a bit of a challenge to apply to graduate school. Many government schools have an application system that includes a space for a GPA, and I couldn't leave it blank - I just wasn't fitting in their boxes. I called the admissions office and told them that I was just going to estimate one for the purposes of applying. I ultimately chose to go to a private school for my master's degree, which could handle the missing GPA without difficulty, and I attended the University of San Francisco. I did well in the program, because I had found my footing earlier and now knew how to study. I also took time off of work around midterms and finals, so I would have the amount of time to study that I now knew it took to do well. I got a GPA from that program.
I got a permanent professional job in the midst of my master's program, and started working for an environmental consulting firm. They offered a flexible schedule, so I could work full-time usually, but also take unpaid time off to focus on my studies as needed.
My master's was not based on original data collection, and I knew upon graduating with my master's that I wanted to continue on to a PhD. I wanted to generate the science that my work at the consulting firm was depending on. I wanted to be part of advancing what we knew about the world; therefore, I applied to local PhD programs. I didn't get into any of them. It was a huge blow. I thought that if I had the required grades, if I had enough experience, I would naturally be able to continue on in my education. I thought because I didn't get in, I must just not be good enough to get in ever. I now understand that isn't how that works, especially at the PhD level. There are many more qualified applicants than positions available for them, and grades are just part of what they are looking at. (Dr. Rachel Wigginton has assembled a wonderful guide for those looking to apply to graduate school, available as Part 1 and Part 2), and some of it is just luck and timing. If it matters, be persistent.
After I did not get into the PhD program, I continued on working with the consulting firm, and I got to work with wonderful people on amazing projects for many years. In addition to plenty of paperwork, I got to do botanical surveys in the desert, survey for bird nests along urban creeks, run a restoration project on a remote pacific island, and work in many other beautiful places. I was also able to pay off my student loans, buy a house, and start a family. I also dropped to part-time for a year so I could work at an impactful non-profit part time. It was a good job. But I couldn't let go of the desire to participate in science more fully. So I applied for PhD programs again, I told myself this would be the last time, and if I didn't get in, I would let it go. This time - I found a good fit with an amazing professor, and I was accepted, and it started what has been one of the most challenging and rewarding journeys of my professional life. In order to get into the program, I needed to now take calculus, which was part of the admissions requirements for the program. I had attempted calculus earlier in my education, and dropped the class after spectacularly failing the midterm. I was working full-time, and had not put in the time I needed to do well in a STEM class. Now, with my graduate school acceptance letter from UC Davis in hand - I returned to my local community college to take calculus again. This time I was incredibly motivated, I had been accepted into my dream PhD program after 13 years of wanting it - and I now needed to pass a class that I failed before. This time I put in the required time and work. I was in the tutoring center every week, 2 days per week. I went to office hours with the professor, and I spent many hours every week making sure I knew everything backwards and forwards. And I passed the first midterm with 100%. I'm keeping that exam forever. I might frame that exam and hang it next to my failing high school grades, my initial rejection letter from graduate school, and my doctoral diploma.
During my time as a graduate student, I participated on the graduate admissions committee. I saw how potential incoming students were ranked - and yes, grades and standardized tests scores mattered (the GRE requirement has since been removed from my program). However, the most important part of acceptance was if there was a professor who had space in their lab and interest in the work that particular student wanted to do. There were loads of highly qualified candidates, amazingly qualified candidates, that there just wasn't a spot for. There are also students accepted into the program who did not have good undergraduate grades, because they had proven themselves to be promising researchers in other ways, and/or had developed a good working relationship with a professor, and were accepted into that lab.
The point of telling you all of these stories is to make sure that you understand that there are many paths to a successful STEM career. Although, yes, grades matter in some ways, they are not all that matters and they will not stand in your way if you persist and find your own path to success.
One final story. In the decades after my 5th grade teacher had told me about being a wildlife biologist, I had never gotten to see a fox trot across a grassy field in front of me like I had imagined at the time. I had since learned that foxes are generally a bit more stealthy than that, and I mostly only got a glimpse of them on wildlife cameras, or a brief glimpse in person on a night hike, or saw one stalking marmots at a field station. When I was at UC Davis, I got to help out on a field research course as a teaching assistant. As part of this class, we took a trip to Santa Cruz Island where there are island foxes. Due to a phenomenon known as Island Tameness, these island foxes are not as skittish as those on the mainland, and they are easily visible all over the field station. As I sat there with a group of inspiring young biologists, I watched a small fox trot by, right in front of us, in the grassy field bathed in the warm sunlight - and it all came together. Persistence.
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Aviva-Rossi
https://www.linkedin.com/in/avivarossi/
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