PhD graduate follows her dream, one step at a time
Afaf Saliba Jaafar grew up in a tiny village in Lebanon, where her dream of pursuing a career in science seemed, at first, a farfetched one. But with a series of small steps, and a chess scholarship, she found herself on the path to a PhD.
“Nothing was very well planned, but I had the dream that I wanted to do something good for this world,” Jaafar said.
Jaafar, a soon-to-be PhD graduate of the Integrated Biomedical Sciences program at the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, attributes her early interest in science to a house filled with books.
“I remember I read a story about the Nobel Prize and read about a female Nobel Prize winner and thought, I want do something like that too,” she said.
When Jaafar obtained a scholarship for her elite chess skills, she was able to leave her small town for a prestigious university in a big city. Later, she enrolled at the American University of Beirut, which was her first exposure to research and provided her opportunities to study in the U.S.
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