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May
22, 2004, 16S:
Special Commencement Issue
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Bechtel
Achievement Award: Emery
Sanford, ME
Bechtel
Engineering Scholarship:
Austin Minnich, Eng. Science
Departmental
Citation Winners:
Ryan Doan, BioE
Sarah Gidding, CEE
Kevin Simler, EECS
Olivia Or, Eng. Science
Anthony Paganini, IEOR
Priam Pillai, MSE
Matt Panzer, ME
Ryan Hannink, NE
Other
Departmental Awards
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Photo
by Nick Lammers
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Bioengineering
Citation: Ryan Doan
Junior Ryan Doan has no problem
with discipline. He does 70 pushups a day, makes it to the gym six to
seven days a week, and survived his freshman year in a demanding Army
ROTC program.
Ryan says that the hours he spends exercising haven’t stolen time
and energy from his classes and extracurricular involvements, but rather
provides the balm that helps him cope with stress and gives him the balance
to tackle his heavy work load.
After graduation next year, the health-conscious Ryan has plans of heading
to medical school. Those career goals are what prompted him to leave ROTC,
which he greatly enjoyed due to the camaraderie he shared with fellow
cadets.
“The ROTC helped me build my leadership skills, but my first priority
was medical school rather than becoming a career military officer,”
he says.
The son of a Silicon Valley computer engineer and a logistics specialist
at IBM, Ryan knew he wanted to be a doctor since the end of high school,
when he volunteered in a morgue in Palo Alto.
There he helped residents perform autopsies and saw how disease spreads
through the body. Not only did this fascinate Ryan, but it motivated him
to exercise and eat a healthy diet.
Ryan chose Berkeley’s BioE department because he liked the idea of
growing with the nascent major. And grow he did. At Berkeley he had the
opportunity to do graduate-level research in the area of biomechanics
and tissue engineering, studying ways to grow new bones.
While Ryan has had paid jobs, such as designing Web sites for a lab that
tests the safety of electrical devices, his favorite job was volunteering
at the morgue. He dreams one day of becoming a pathologist, but is also
considering a career in research as a physician scientist.
This summer he’ll work in a low- income medical clinic in Capetown,
South Africa where seven doctors see between 300 to 400 patients a day.
He’s looking forward to the tough experience. At Berkeley he’s
learned how to take hits and keep moving forward.
“I now know how to stay motivated when things don’t work out
as planned,” he says.
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