This Monday Minute is highlighting two amazing Black females in STEM that you may not be aware of…Erin Jackson and Dr. Kizzmekia S Corbett.
Let’s start with one of the newest Olympian gold medalists, Erin Jackson, who made history by becoming the first Black woman to win a speed skating medal in the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
Did you know she has a degree in Materials Science & Engineering from the University of Florida?
She didn’t stop her education there…while in Salt Lake City, she obtained an associate’s degree in Computer Science and is now pursuing an associate’s in kinesiology. Erin would like to combine her degrees to pursue a career in biomechanics. One of the focused areas of biomechanics is evaluating force on human joins and limbs.
How fitting for her to combine her passion for sports with STEM!
Erin says education is a hobby for her, and she loves learning! She does not shy away from being referred to as a nerd.
The second highlight is Dr. Kizzmekia S Corbett.She is a research fellow and the scientific lead for the Coronavirus Vaccines & Immunopathogenesis Team at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). She received a B.S. in Biological Sciences, with a secondary major in Sociology from the University of Maryland–Baltimore County. She was a Meyerhoff Scholar and an NIH undergraduate scholar. She obtained her Ph.D. in Microbiology and Immunology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
One of her most recent notable accomplishments is being one of the scientists who in early 2020 helped develop an mRNA-based vaccine for COVID-19.
Corbett is an advocator of STEM education and vaccine awareness in the community.
[partial source: https://asm.org/Biographies/Kizzmekia-S-Corbett,-Ph-D]