Mind-Body Connections

Picture of Nicole Price

Gilman scholar Nicole Price '15's travels fueled by desire to give back

by MaryAlice Bitts-Jackson

Those who understand the mechanics and chemistry of the human body know how to treat illnesses. Those who also understand human societies and minds know how to treat individuals with illnesses in the most effective ways. That’s why Nicole Price ’15, a New York Posse scholar, Social Justice House resident and active volunteer, augments her major in biochemistry & molecular biology with a health-studies certificate and a minor in sociology. And it’s also why she is determined to experience as many different world cultures as she can. 

Price is a 2013 recipient of the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship, a Department of State-sponsored program that offers grants to fund study-abroad opportunities to promising U.S. undergraduate Pell Grant recipients. In August, she will travel to Seoul to take part in the Dickinson in Korea program.

While there, she plans to volunteer as a tutor for elementary-school-aged students and to share her experiences in the Korean educational system with fellow students by blogging. She also hopes to take photos of daily life in Korea—skills she hones as an officer of Dickinson's photography club and as a Red Devils television photographer—that shed light on social issues.  But, she stresses, the greatest benefit she expects to gain from the experience will be to learn how to give back in more meaningful ways as she prepares for a career as a surgeon. 

“If I have valuable experiences with people from as many different backgrounds as possible, I’ll be better able to tailor my approaches to treating a particular person or situation,” explains Price, who got a taste of cultural immersion during Dickinson service trips to New Orleans, Texas and Shanghai. “That’s an invaluable skill in the medical field.”

Published June 28, 2013