![\"Virgilio](\"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/McNair-Lopez2.jpg\")
<\/a>Throughout his four years at Bunnell High School in Stratford, Conn., Virgilio L\u00f3pez III \u201916 (CLAS) had his sights set on attending Fordham University in the Bronx as a pre-med student. He was accepted at his \u2018first choice school,\u2019 but then UConn came along with a strong financial aid package and an enticing campus tour. \u201cThat changed everything,\u201d he says, \u201cand deciding to enroll here instead of at Fordham was the best decision I ever made.\u201d<\/p>\n
Along the way, L\u00f3pez realized that medicine didn\u2019t hold the allure he had anticipated. He found that he loved doing research in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, and that he has a knack \u2013 and a passion \u2013 for mentoring and teaching others. His goal is to enter a Ph.D. program that will prepare him to teach science at the college level.<\/p>\n
Tempo and L\u00f3pez are among the first students to become McNair Scholars<\/a> at UConn, and they represent exactly the type of individuals the program is designed to attract.<\/p>\n McNair is one of the U.S. Department of Education\u2019s TRIO Programs<\/a>. It is named after astronaut Ronald E. McNair, who was on board the ill-fated Challenger space shuttle when it exploded shortly after liftoff in 1986. UConn\u2019s McNair program is open to low-income, first-generation college students and those from populations underrepresented in STEM graduate fields who hope to pursue a Ph.D. degree.<\/p>\n According to program director and assistant vice provost of the Institute for Student Success<\/a> Maria D. Martinez, \u201cMcNair is a small program in numbers, but it makes a huge difference to those who participate in it.\u201d<\/p>\n Chemical engineering as career goal<\/strong><\/p>\n In Tempo\u2019s case, she was bitten by the engineering bug during one of the STEM summer research programs she attended shortly after arriving in this country. After graduating from Wethersfield High School, she began her UConn studies at the Greater Hartford campus, where she concentrated on strengthening her math and chemistry skills. She transferred to Storrs as an engineering major in her sophomore year.<\/p>\n \u201cI was really scared when I started taking classes here,\u201d she says, \u201cespecially since everyone told me my background wasn\u2019t good enough and that engineering was really, really hard. I had a strange accent. Most of my classmates [in engineering] had been here since their freshman year. They all knew each other, and they all seemed so smart. I really felt left out.\u201d<\/p>\n To make matters worse, Tempo failed her first test in Introduction to Chemical Engineering taught by associate professor of chemical & biomolecular engineering William Mustain. And then she failed the second one. To say she was initially discouraged is an understatement.<\/p>\n \u201cI went home crying after both of those tests,\u201d she says. \u201cBut then I just got angry at myself, and I made up my mind that there was no way I was going to fail. I studied and studied, and I passed the third exam with a really high score. I did really well on my final project, too. I passed that course and Professor Mustain told me that I\u2019d set a great example for anyone who is struggling with difficult course material. He said that from then on, he was going to use me as a positive example of what hard work and determination can accomplish. That made me feel really proud.\u201d<\/p>\n But that wasn\u2019t the end of it.<\/p>\n Also a 2014 Rowe scholar<\/a>, Tempo has been doing research at the Institute for Regenerative Engineering<\/a> at UConn Health under the guidance of Professor Yusuf Khan. She represented UConn at the Universitas 21 Undergraduate Research Conference<\/a> in Auckland, New Zealand in the summer of 2015, where she presented details of her tissue engineering project to researchers from around the globe. She has also devoted many hours to mentoring students at the Sport and Medical Sciences Academy and Bulkeley High School in Hartford.<\/p>\n \u201cMy closest mentee is a girl from Colombia who also wants to be an engineer,\u201d Tempo says. \u201cLike me, she started at the Greater Hartford Campus, and she\u2019ll be transferring to Storrs next year as a sophomore. And the best thing is, she\u2019s coming to my graduation in May.\u201d<\/p>\n Tapeworms lead to teaching<\/strong><\/p>\n L\u00f3pez was pretty sure he was headed for medical school when he first arrived at UConn, but an opportunity to participate in the two-week introductory STEM research program as a McNair Fellow and then work in the lab of Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Janine Caira caused him to rethink that goal.<\/p>\n \u201cDr. Caira is an amazing person and she has guided me every step of the way, L\u00f3pez says. “She\u2019s an expert in the biology of tapeworms, and I was able to help in developing a global database of tapeworm species. Working in her lab really showed me how much I love research. She even let me name a new species, so now my little brother Jeremiah has a tapeworm named in his honor \u2013 Platybothrium jeremiahi<\/em>!\u201d<\/p>\n As part of Research Experience for Undergraduates<\/a> (REU), a summer study-abroad program funded by the National Science Foundation, L\u00f3pez spent 10 weeks in the rainforests of Costa Rica observing the behavior of the long-billed hermit hummingbird. After studying the bird\u2019s vocalizations, his hypothesis is that the more intelligent a hummingbird is, the more likely it will produce song variations that distinguish it from other hummingbirds.<\/p>\n He has presented his findings at several different venues, including UConn\u2019s Frontiers in Undergraduate Research<\/a> poster exhibition, the GEN Consortium GRAD Lab <\/a>at Tufts University, and an REU symposium at the La Selva Biological Station in Costa Rica. He is also in the process of writing articles on his research for publication.<\/p>\n But while he\u2019s always been interested in science, and doing research is something he loves, when L\u00f3pez\u00a0 became a Supplemental Instruction leader for introductory biology courses at the Academic Achievement Center, he made another discovery. \u201cI\u2019ve found that I absolutely love teaching,\u201d he says, \u201cand now that\u2019s my goal. I want to get a Ph.D. in biology and one day become a professor.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/a><\/a><\/a>