Calvin News

“I just know I love research, and I know I’d love to spend the next five to seven years of my life working on projects and learning more,” said Riley Cornwell ’28, a biology and biochemistry major from Fishers, Indiana. 
 
“If I hadn’t had the opportunity to engage in summer research, I probably wouldn’t have known I had this passion,” said Kailey Addo ’28, a biochemistry major from Accra, Ghana. 
 
Cornwell and Addo spent this past summer researching “in the field.” Cornwell’s project focused on gathering data on the ongoing bioeffects in colonial birds at contaminated Great Lakes sites. Addo spent ten weeks in Guatemala investigating the importance of cloud forests in the regulation of a rural area’s whole water cycle. 
 
Their research is providing data to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in an effort to protect colonial waterbirds and to groups in Guatemala who are advocating for less deforestation in an effort to increase access to clean water. While their findings are important, so too are the personal discoveries they are making along the way.

Making deeper discoveries that go beyond data

“I love to learn and learning for me is way more fun when I know what can be done with the knowledge,” said Addo. “So, it was really awesome to see what I learned in Gen Chem coming together in research and when you actually see that happen, I knew this is definitely for me.” 
 
Through her research experiences, including one after her freshman year, Addo discovered that she wants to be a part of research that goes on behind the scenes and is hoping to work in medicinal chemistry in the future. 
 
For Cornwell, it was much the same.  
 
“I love the natural world, specifically how it connects to my faith. I think the more and more I study creation, I fall more in love with God and who He is, and I understand more about Him,” said Cornwell, who hopes to go to grad school to get a PhD in environmental toxicology with the hopes of either leaning into the research side of things or into academia and becoming a professor herself.

Partnering with professors

Cornwell and Addo are just two of dozens upon dozens of students across multiple disciplines who were in the lab at Calvin University and in the field this past summer researching alongside their professors, who they say not only invite them into their research, but genuinely care about helping them discover their passions and callings. 
 
“Research is such an important stepping stone in my career,” said Drew VanWoerkom ’27, a biology and biochemistry double major from Denver, Colorado. VanWoerkom has researched with Professor Grasman the past two years, first in the lab, then this past year in the field. “Research is awesome at Calvin because you know your professors well and you know they care about you. So, I think just being able to do research with professors and having them mentor you, right alongside you, it’s very personal. I love that about the research.” 
 
“All the professors have very real knowledge of what it’s like to work in industry,” said Will Elsen ’27, a computer science major from Chicago, Illinois, who researched this past summer alongside Professor Rocky Chang. “They prepare you well for interviews and for actually working in the field. They care very much about the quality of your work.”

Discovering future careers and callings

Elsen is hoping to work in cybersecurity after graduation and said through this research project he was able to make a lot of connections within his field. VanWoerkom is hoping to pursue a PhD in applied ecology and to study genetics too. 
 
For all of the students who did research this past summer in fields ranging from biology to engineering, psychology to social work, and cybersecurity to political science, the results of their research go beyond any groundbreaking discoveries they made, major publications their research appeared in, or conferences they presented at. Their research stoked their curiosity with every square inch of God’s world and how they can use their gifts in it. 
 
“Research this summer has allowed me to not only integrate my faith with science, but also fuel that curiosity of getting to ask questions, getting to look into things, and also as a way of stewardship: ‘how can I help the environment around me that we coexist in with the gifts that I’ve been given,” said Cornwell. 

“I respect and love Professor Vander Griend so much, because he helped me really blossom into the field of research,” said Addo. 
 
“I want to do something impactful and to do something meaningful so I can support and restore God’s creation and I think I see that by doing research,” said VanWoerkom.