{"id":57602,"date":"2015-10-02T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2015-10-02T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/uri-student-awarded-scholarship-from-r-i-blood-center\/"},"modified":"2015-10-02T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T00:00:00","slug":"uri-student-awarded-scholarship-from-r-i-blood-center","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2015\/10\/uri-student-awarded-scholarship-from-r-i-blood-center\/","title":{"rendered":"URI student awarded scholarship from R.I. Blood Center"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\tWarwick resident aims to work for Doctors Without Borders<\/b><\/p>\n

KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 October 2, 2015 \u2013 Nikkole Turgeon has long been fascinated with the complexities of the human body, and she has always dreamed of a career as a doctor. The University of Rhode Island senior is well on her way to achieving her goal, but she is taking an atypical path.<\/p>\n


\n\tTurgeon, a resident of Warwick, is first working to become a certified medical laboratory scientist through a program at URI that includes a yearlong clinical internship at a local hospital. Her academic efforts received a boost this year when she was awarded a $5,000 scholarship from the Rhode Island Blood Center that came with a part-time job.<\/p>\n


\n\tAccording to Kimberlee Gayheart at the Blood Center, Turgeon received the scholarship because of her interest in blood banking, high grade point average and excellent references. \u201cShe also articulated her interest and motivation the strongest during the interview. And she had solid work experience and excellent community involvement,\u201d Gayheart said.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cNikkole is an outstanding student and an excellent choice for the Blood Center scholarship because of her demonstrated excellence in medical laboratory science,\u201d said Greg Paquette, director of URI\u2019s biotechnology and medical laboratory science programs. \u201cWe are grateful to the Rhode Island Blood Center for providing this great opportunity for one of our outstanding medical laboratory science seniors.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tThe Blood Center established the annual scholarship in 2012 after having difficulty finding enough certified laboratory scientists to hire. The paid part-time job that comes with the scholarship makes it unique and especially desirable.<\/p>\n


\n\tTurgeon works 20 hours per week at the Blood Center in Providence, helping the lab technicians perform scientific tests to identify blood groups and test for diseases. She also conducts blood component quality control testing and labeling. <\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cI\u2019m doing the things that don\u2019t require me to be certified already,\u201d she said. \u201cI get to see a lot of what the techs do and learn from them.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tShe is also completing a full-time internship at Rhode Island Hospital that includes attending lectures and conducting laboratory testing.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cWe get a little taste of chemistry, microbiology and hematology so we\u2019re prepared for the board exam in June,\u201d Turgeon said.<\/p>\n


\n\tEventually she wants to study infectious diseases in developing nations and work with Doctors Without Borders or a similar international medical agency, an interest she developed from a URI class.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cBut for now I want to graduate from URI, pass the board exam, go abroad, and then go to med school,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019ve got a ways to go. Good thing I love learning.\u201d

\n
\nPhoto by Rhode Island Blood Center\n\t<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Warwick resident aims to work for Doctors Without Borders KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 October 2, 2015 \u2013 Nikkole Turgeon has long been fascinated with the complexities of the human body, and she has always dreamed of a career as a doctor. The University of Rhode Island senior is well on her way to achieving her goal, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57604,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57602"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57602\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}