Women in Science
Deciding on a career in science
Video clip: Leanne had a lecturer who inspired her. Science suddenly became interesting and she realised that advances in nutrition could change people’s health.
So I then took a year off between the first year of my bachelor’s degree and the second year and actually worked again, worked in a different number of jobs, part-time jobs just to earn some money and think about what I wanted to do. And decided actually I did want to do it [a degree]. So I went back, with I guess a bit more vigour, and a clearer head, and it wasn’t until I was very privileged to have a lecturer who walked in, and I always remember when he spoke about fatty acids, up until that time I’d sort of gone ‘Oh it’s quite interesting but oh I don’t know’, and he came in and started talking about fatty acids and everything just fell into place for me. I was, that was it. Suddenly science became interesting and nutrition became sort of interesting and powerful and something that could be changed and change people’s health, which I thought was important. And, so I did my undergraduate degree, my BSc.
Did anything else at university encourage you to go down that route? Was it just this one person?
It was that but I think I also found an area, so apart from the, this one person, sort of I guess giving me some confidence to go down that way. I think I started realising I actually liked the learning, and I liked the acquisition of knowledge and things that that you can, because of the area that I was studying, nutrition that had an implication on health. So I liked the idea that you could do something good for someone, you could help them have a better life through their health, or through their lifestyle. So I became more interested in it the more I learnt. I think it was just, I had to get past putting my toes in the water and sort of submerging myself and then that became it just became something I wanted to do.