The Jackuelyn Harris High School
Summer Training in Aging Research
(HS STAR) program is designed to provide
exceptional underrepresented junior and
senior high school students from San Diego
with a chance to learn and practice the daily
activities involved in aging research alongside
a UC San Diego Center for Healthy
Aging faculty mentor. The program encourages
students to consider a career in aging
or academic geriatrics.
Here are a couple testimonials highlighting
the program.
Dorota Skowronska-Krawczyk, PhD
HS STAR Mentor and Volunteer
Assistant Professor, Department of
Ophthalmology, UC San Diego
dsklab.ucsd.edu
HS STAR program is important on two levels.
First, it allows young people to come to the
laboratory and understand what it means
to be a scientist. Students have a chance
to plan and perform experiments, analyze
data, participate in lab discussions during lab
meetings, and contribute to the research. I
believe this gives them the background to
decide in the future whether they would like
to continue a scientific career.
Second positive impact of the program is
specific to HS STAR program—it recruits
young students to work on a subject relevant
to aging, healthy aging, mechanisms of
age-related diseases and studies, etc. This
is particularly important as it can recruit new
people—new brains investigating aging,
which, in the future, may help design new
treatments or helping devices for aging
society.
I consider this program quite unique
because of its focus, and I strongly believe
that we should encourage students to follow
this path.
I was volunteering in the lab since I entered
college and I remember how great an experience
it was for me. Not only did it allow
me to learn techniques and critical-thinking
skills way before my peers, but it also gave
me an understanding of what science is and
what it means to do experiments—both
concepts quite unfamiliar to me at that time.
Therefore, when I saw that the program
helps young people to achieve their goals,
I wanted to be included. This program is
especially close to what we do in the laboratory
(aging); therefore, I plan to be included
as long as I can to help people in their
early careers.
This year’s project of HS STAR students was
exploratory. We were investigating changes
in trabecular meshwork—part of the eye
that is responsible for maintaining the
healthy intraocular pressure. In this project,
students analyzed the presence of
senescent cells and adult stem cells in
trabecular meshwork. After five weeks of
study, we concluded that there are many
senescent cells in the tissues isolated from
patients suffering on glaucoma. Additionally,
students observed the presence of
scattered cells that could be named adult
stem cells, which in the future could be
harnessed to repair aged tissue in situ. This
is the beginning of very exciting studies
in the lab, and we wish to continue them
during the year. We had two very eager-to-learn
students, and this is why we were able
to achieve so much.
Allison Balaguer
High School Student and HS STAR
Trainee
I am so thankful for the amazing opportunity
to work in Dr. Suzi Hong’s lab on her
HAPI-CHI research project! Dr. Hong is
the associate professor in the Department
of Family Medicine and Public Health at
UC San Diego.
The purpose of the HAPI-CHI
study is to find out whether participation
in a healthy aging seminar series or tai chi
classes has an effect on the physical and
mental health of older adults with elevated
blood pressure. Participants are randomly
assigned to receive either twelve weeks of
a free healthy aging seminar series or tai chi
classes. They are also asked to complete
detailed cardiovascular assessments,
laboratory blood tests, a bicycle exercise
task, and questionnaires.
These first-hand experiences gained from
working in a real-life lab environment with
Dr. Hong offered something I could not
have learned in a classroom setting. This
internship has helped me advance my career
goals by adding to my skill set and allowing
me to learn about the different aspects of
aging research.
After high school, I plan to further my
education by going to a four-year college or
university to study biology and be the first
person in my family to graduate from college.
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