» JENNIFER DOUDNA: This is really amazing , and amazing
moment. I want to start by thanking Professor Olson for
that really kind, very generous introduction. Thank
you.
And then secondly, I want to say congratulations graduates
and fellow Sagehen's!
So proud of all of you.
And thirdly, I want to
say to
President Starr in the Board of Trustees and faculty and
colleagues here, thank you so, so much for including me in
your special moment. It is a real thrill for me to be here.
I'm to be very
honest with you, the first time I gave a speech at graduation
I was 17 years
old, I was graduating from
high school in Hawaii, where I grew up here and I was
incredible he
nervous, I was so nervous that I got up in front of the crowd
and kind of froze. I really didn't know what to
say. A few years have gone by
since then, a few things have happened since then. I feel
nonetheless the same sense of anticipation and excitement
today for all of you because of what you are about to
embark on in your journey.
I had an extra ordinary experience here at
Pomona because I came here, I was quite young, I was 17. I
came from Hilo, my parents were
faculty at the
University of Hawaii but did have a lot of money come in and
have means to come and visit the campus before hand. They
put me on a plane by myself and I arrived here in
Claremont. I checked in to mud hall where I look
freshman year. Some of you may know it. And what happened was
that it just turned
into an incredible experience for me. Because it opened the
door for so many opportunities. When I was growing up
in Hilo is kind of a nerdy kid. I love science and math , I
knew I
loved chemistry because of my high school history teacher,
Mrs. Wong, wherever you are thank you very much. I knew I
wanted to study biochemistry, but I didn't know how to do
it. I didn't
know how to get into a laboratory
, and fortunately the work study program here give me that
opportunity. I had a
chance to do things like water orchids and wash glassware.
And I was thrilled to do it. I was so excited
to be in a real research lavatory for the first time.
Eventually
, I got to do what I really wanted to do. I really wanted
to work for a summer in the love of
my biochemistry professor Donna
Sharon Panasenko.
We were sitting bacteria and how they respond to
starvation, and what I learned for the first time about
myself was that I could do
this. I could do experiments that worked written down
anywhere.
There wasn't a right answer to get, because nobody knew the
answer.
That is really what research is all about. After that summer
extremes here at Pomona, I was absolutely
hooked and I realized this is what I want to do with my life.
I want to be a scientist. The big question
was, could I really do that? I didn't know. When I
left Pomona, I graduated in
ancient history to people here.
But 85, I had the opportunity -first I went to
Boston for graduate school, and I went to Boulder, Colorado
where I trained and in my postdoctoral work. Then my
path eventually led me to the University of California
Berkeley where I am very proud to work at a public university
where we
really like a place like Pomona. We really try to open
the door to everyone that wants to
come and study, and learn, and give them opportunities in
their life. Through that
experience , that led me in various directions in my
research but eventually to
CRISPR which began as you heard a little bit in the
introduction, as an extraordinary, but
frankly very small curiosity driven collaboration with
another
scientist. And together with our students , we started
researching
something that seemed very esoteric at the time. Mainly
how do bacteria fight viral infection?
That led to an understanding of the chemistry of that
process that allowed us to harness it as a powerful
technology for altering
DNA in any cell, and doing it with a level of precision that
was not possible before.
And importantly, the technology is not so difficult to use
that people can't readily adopt it and adopt it. As
you've heard, I am so pleased to know this, it has now been
woven into not only colleges and various institutional and
company
operations, but also high school teachers would we have
been working with the Berkeley high teachers in
our own town, and many other teachers
around the country who have been able to adopt CRISPR as a
technology they
can use with their students as a teaching tool, and to give
students a handle on the real way that
scientists are now manipulating DNA in the lab, and as you
heard also in important applications in the future. I
really want to share with you I think in my experience in
life, probably the most important thing -I have
met a lot of people that are a lot smarter than me, believe
me. I have observed and observe this now, I think
real success comes when you identify what you are
passionate about doing. Then you do it
go after it. If I could tell
you how many
times people told me "that experiment will never work,
that's kind of a silly idea".
Even my high school guidance counselor telling me girls
don't do science. If I had listened to that, I probably
wouldn't be here now. I think having a degree of persistence
is really important, I think we heard
that from both of our wonderful student speakers
this morning. I would encourage all of you to think
about that as you go forward we all
face challenges in our life, or personal life and professional
life, that is as part of living. As part of being
human. I think what sets apart those that really are
successful in whatever they
want to do is just erasing those challenging moments
entering them as much as possible into opportunity.
Again, I really appreciated the messages we
heard from our student speakers this morning print so thank
you, thank you. Congratulations everyone, I'm
thrilled to be here to celebrate with you. Congrats.