Update

I'm back!

During the summer of 2013, I spent 2 months in rural New Mexico learning to train mustangs for adoption. Since then, I've found myself re-reading blog posts, reminiscing about the good times, but also remembering the challenges - and all of the practice I had problem solving.

A lot has happened in the past year and a half:

• I graduated from UC Davis with a Bachelors in Animal Science and minors in Psychology and Statistics.

Ta da...

• I traveled to China and got to shadow a graduate student doing behavioral research on Giant Pandas at the BiFengXia Research Base.

A Giant Panda eating bamboo in his enclosure. The pandas in the public viewing enclosures sure had it nice,
but those in breeding or research enclosures had much less environmental enrichment.

• I took a two-week trip to Europe with my boss Dr. Sophia Yin and got to help teach one of her international seminars and we also spent a full week learning the art (and science) of scent-detection dog training from Lennart Wetterholm of HundCampus.

Teaching our Swedish hosts about "jazz hands."
They were also VERY amused with the English idiom "cut the cheese" :)

• At work, I completed my Low Stress Handling Silver-level certification and began developing the curriculum for Gold and Instructor-levels.

In the center, myself and Jenna our Behavior tech, and on the sides Royan and Timothy, two of our summer interns.

• I began an online Masters program studying Applied Statistics through Penn State University's World Campus. No fun pictures for this one...
• I applied for a full-funded PhD program in Australia with Dr. Pauleen Bennett, one of the leading scientists in the field of Anthrozoology (the study of human-animal interactions).

Everything was looking good. Then tragedy. On September 28th, 2014, Dr. Sophia Yin lost her life to suicide. Everything I thought I knew and could rely on was suddenly pulled out from under me. I moved back home with my parents and buried myself away, some days pretending everything was okay, other days shocked and angry. Looking back, Dr. Yin was the one who pushed me to set goals, and pursue dreams. I've spent the last three months picking myself back up and vowing to live my life in a way that would have made Dr. Yin proud.

Since losing Dr. Yin, I've completed my certification through the Certification Council of Professional Dog Trainers and am now officially a dog trainer. I was successful in applying to the PhD program at La Trobe University with Dr. Pauleen Bennet and will be spending the next three years living in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia (2 hours North of Melbourne). Life is an adventure and you get out of it what you put in. Sometimes things don't work out the way you thought they would but things definitely won't work out the way you want them to if you can't commit yourself 100% to what you want. I am looking forward to putting myself out there and learning a lot in Australia.

#MakingHerProud