WHS Alumni Spotlight – Trisha Sackett

Hi All…it’s Tricia Sackett, Woodsville High School Class of 2016. I didn’t exactly have a linear direction in regards to what I wanted to major in when I got to college. In high school, I thought I would major in fine arts but when I started at Plymouth State University I was a psychology major with my focus on early childhood development. At the end of my freshmen year, I decided to change my major to environmental biology after I took a class on agricultural sustainability. I had taken a leap in a direction I never explored before, as far as academics go, and the transition was a bit difficult. I didn’t even take chemistry or calculus in high school but I powered through it anyway; admittedly I liked the challenge, even if that meant occasionally crying while doing homework… In the end, I made it, and even though my degree was in environmental biology, and I still had a passion for it, I had a deep interest in molecular and microbiology. Throughout half my college career I had started interning for a biotechnologies lab in Lebanon, NH. I had applied for a full-time research associate position at that same laboratory, Adimab, in the molecular biology core department, which I was eventually hired for. Adimab as a whole manufactures fully-human IgGs, antibodies, using our proprietary yeast platform for biotherapeutic uses, but I specifically handle the cloning, plasmid isolation, and sequencing for our projects. I’m in a work environment now where I always have the opportunity to expand my knowledge in my field and other related antibody engineering technologies. In fact, I’m going to my first business conference in San Diego, CA this December! I work alongside a great team and an awesome company that’s innovative and caring about its employees. I also keep my personal life busy with skiing, hiking, traveling, and now house-hunting. In summary, I’m doing adult things. Take care WHS students!