My name is Jada Radford and I am an undergraduate biology student attending Marian University. I am aspiring to pursue a career as a certified Genetic Counselor - a medical professional who counsels patients with disease of a genetic basis. As a part of my journey on this career path, I have had the pleasure of shadowing in the Department of Molecular and Medical Genetics at Indiana University Health Methodist hospital in Indianapolis, Indiana this summer. Additionally, under the direction of Dr. Makayla Lancaster in collaboration with Dr. Brett Graham at the IU School of Medicine. I developed a research question and submitted an abstract about how fatty acid metabolism is effected in mice models with Mitochondrial Encephalomyopathy, which is a genetic mitochondrial disorder. I submitted this abstract this June to be presented at the American Society of Human Genetics in Boston, MA and it was accepted! This GoFund Me campaign is thus in response to this wonderful news, as the cost to register and travel to this conference will be out of pocket for me. While funding from my university is an option, it is not a guarantee. Therefore, I am pleading to you, reader! Your generosity will help me present my hard work at this conference, which will not only improve my chances of being accepted into graduate genetic counseling programs, but also grant me the invaluable experience of being immersed in scientific community in a way I haven’t pursued before. The funding attained from this campaign will go toward registering for the conference, traveling to Boston, and hotel costs over the course of the trip. The conference will be held October 15th through 17th, so we are about a month away! Thank you for being apart of my story and your consideration.