Excerpt: Meet Nikki

Nikki is a bright woman who has learned a great deal about
herself in the past few years. Born in Knoxville, Tennessee,
she now lives with her husband in Sterling, Virginia. The couple
has been married less than one year and she said her marriage was
her most important milestone to date. Nikki explained that she feels
she is on her way to being successful. She defined success as “happiness
and peace with ones accomplishments.” She stated she does
not feel totally there because she is “working in a soulless job.” She
works as an environmental consultant for various government agencies
and consults about environmental toxicology. For now her job
“means nothing but a paycheck” to her because she reviews and evaluates
data to create risk assessments for environmental organizations
instead of helping others or working on an environmental initiative.

She tutors biology in her free time. She has found tutoring to be
more fulfilling than her day job and wants one day to focus on teaching
full time. She has not decided if she will go back to college to
obtain her Doctorate to be able to teach college students or if she
will pursue her teaching certificate to teach secondary biology. Being
a “nerdy scientist [who] liked to explore things” during her childhood
is something she said she wants to share with a new generation.
She explained that education “is crucial to existence, everyone should
have access and everyone should get the same opportunities.”