Four military academy students arrived at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation expecting their summer internship to provide lab skills. They left having learned lessons that will benefit them far beyond the lab.
For the Air Force Academy’s Hayden Ward, that lesson was perseverance. For West Point cadet Joey Shi, it was attention to detail. Naval Academy midshipman Aaron Gu experienced firsthand the cutting-edge nature of biomedical research. For his fellow midshipman Shawn Palmer, it was the value of learning from co-workers.
All four completed OMRF’s John H. Saxon Service Academy Summer Research Program, which provides hands-on research conducted with senior-level scientists at the Oklahoma City foundation.
OMRF Board Member John Saxon III, M.D., created the program to honor his father, a West Point graduate and career Air Force pilot who taught at the U.S. Air Force Academy. Nearly 50 service academy students have now interned at OMRF since 2009.
Studying wound repair under scientist Lorin Olson, Ph.D., Ward learned the importance of bouncing back from perceived failure. “You’re here to learn, and if you don’t understand or if a new scientific technique doesn’t work the first time, don’t get down on yourself,” said Ward, a rising junior at the Air Force Academy. “I’ll take that with me in whatever field I wind up in.”
West Point’s Shi explored three molecules as possible treatments or preventions for a condition that precedes chronic kidney disease. Studying in the lab of OMRF Vice President of Research Courtney Griffin, Ph.D., Shi discovered the importance of focus and concentration.
“Otherwise, you may put something in the wrong vial or else organize or label something incorrectly, and it can derail your entire experiment,” said Shi, a rising junior.
Gu and Palmer plan to attend medical school upon graduation from Annapolis and ultimately become Navy physicians.
In the lab of OMRF physician-scientist Hal Scofield, M.D., Gu studied the genes of an Ohio Amish community that has a high prevalence of both the autoimmune disease lupus and an extremely rare disease marked by skin lesions and developmental delays.
Gu said the experience opened his eyes to sophistication of medical research today. “It was far more cutting-edge than I expected,” he said.
Working in Griffin’s lab, Palmer studied vision disorders in infants and people with diabetes that occur when blood vessels grow out of control in the retina.
Palmer, a Choctaw High School graduate who has been planning to eventually practice emergency medicine in the Navy, said his summer experience opened his mind to possibly incorporating research into his career goals.
His main internship takeaway? “Every single person in your lab opens your mind to just how expansive science can be and how important is to know your peers.”
Among those who can attest to the value of a Saxon internship worth is U.S. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Connor Fullenwider. The Muskogee native served as one of the program’s first two scholars, even before it bore the Saxon name.
After graduating from the Naval Academy in 2009, Fullenwider attended medical school at the University of Oklahoma. Today he oversees the pain clinic at Naval Medical Center San Diego.
“I would encourage other service academy members to jump at the opportunity of the Saxon internship,” he said. “It provides hands-on research experience unlike anything you’d get at a typical undergrad institution.”
