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Kim Bassi of Johnstown, Pa. followed in the footsteps of her brother, Christopher, when she enrolled at Lafayette. “He graduated in 1999 and at the time when I was applying to colleges/universities, I was excited about the opportunities that he had as a sophomore for EXCEL research, and officer positions in academic clubs as well as Greek life,” she recalls. “This was exactly the environment that I was looking for.”
“Most importantly, I was looking for smaller classes where I could have interactions with students and professors,” adds Bassi, a behavioral neuroscience major. “I didn’t want to be a number in the classroom – I wanted to be a participant. Lafayette definitely provided this atmosphere.”
During her senior year, Bassi saw these Lafayette advantages translate into job offers from Accenture, Mallinckrodt Baker, and Akzo Nobel. She chose to work at Akzo Nobel as associate monitor of clinical trials for pharmaceutical research.
Bassi will be using some of the skills she developed while doing EXCEL research with John Shaw, assistant professor of psychology, in the summer after her first year at Lafayette. The two studied attitudes on genetic testing for inherited diseases, sharing results at conferences.
During her junior year, Bassi and Wendy Hill, professor of psychology and head of the neuroscience program, investigated when the biological rhythms, such as eating and sleeping, of domestic chicks are established. This EXCEL project led Bassi to pursue an honors thesis for further study.
There are many ways that the Lafayette Experience helped Bassi reach her career goals, she says. “The research experiences pointed me to a combination of both lab work and social work,” she explains. “I will be able to use all the relevant biology and chemistry background I have in understanding the pharmaceuticals, but also the psychology that I have been exposed to because much of the work will be with physicians and their patients. Certainly, the leadership positions that I have held at Lafayette, from Psychology Club to Greek life to the Lafayette Activities Forum, have helped me in the job search, interview processes, and choosing a position that I feel fits me best.”