Faces of WISEST: Allegra Martel

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to participate in the WISEST Summer Research Program in 2016, and it was an experience that has greatly influenced my life. Prior to the SRP, I knew I liked science, but I wasn’t sure how I fit into the world of STEM. I still remember one of the presentations I attended during the program, where a biomedical engineering professor came in to talk to us about her work. It was the first time I had ever heard of biomedical engineering, and it was in that moment when I realized that engineering might be where I fit.  

Although I applied for the WISEST SRP in the hopes of learning about research, one of the greatest lessons my WISEST supervisors and mentors taught me was to find something I was passionate about and pursue it. Since then, I have taken that lesson to heart and am currently pursuing a degree in Chemical Engineering at the University of Alberta! I am very grateful for my experience with WISEST as it provided me with a support network of like-minded people, many of whom I am still in contact with today. WISEST encouraged me to challenge myself and showed me that being afraid of failure isn’t a good enough reason to not do something. It all came full circle in my third year of university when I found myself seated in a biomedical engineering class, taught by the very same professor who introduced me to biomedical engineering all those summers ago.