Hi everyone, my name is Demi De La Vara and I am attending California State University, Northridge. My major is Biochemistry and this year is going to be my 5th year at CSUN. As many of you know, I love school and I plan on attending Medical School after I graduate CSUN. My aspiration is to become an OBGYN doctor. Some of you may know, the requirements for Medical school applications are clinical hours, volunteer hours, and research hours. I was selected 1 out of 12 students by the whole CSUN Biology Department to be part of the Tropical Biology Semester Research Program. This program is very unique, because it is only given at CSUN every 2 years and there are very little position's to be filled. I will be traveling to different parts of Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands for 9 weeks to conduct various types of research based off the wild life in Ecuador. This includes bats, monkeys, reptiles, insects and so much more, as well as the behavior of these species. We will be gone from February 22nd through April 25th and at the end of the semester in May, we will present our findings to the Biology Department. I would be beyond grateful for any donations to help me, be able to attend this great opportunity; it would be a dream come true to be able to reach my goal, so I can attend this program.

Thank you so much,

Demi De La Vara

Link to the CSUN website about the program:

https://www.csun.edu/science-mathematics/biology/tropical-biology-semester