INBRE Scholars – Meet Mitch Chlopek

Mitch Chlopek

Twenty-eight students from nine different undergraduate and community college programs have joined the Institutional Development Award (IDeA) Networks of Biomedical Research Excellence (INBRE) program this summer.

The program was created to:

• Expose students to serious biomedical research;
  
• Build a statewide biomedical research infrastructure between undergraduate and graduate institutions; and
  
• Strengthen each undergraduate institution’s infrastructure and increase its capacity to conduct cutting-edge biomedical and behavioral research.

Below, we get to know more about INBRE scholar Mitch Chlopek.

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• Name: Mitch Chlopek
  
• Hometown: Norfolk
  
• School: University of Nebraska at Omaha

I became very interested in science in high school. I had a fantastic biology teacher who would take the time to tell us about exciting advancements in the world of science. The class fed off of her enthusiasm for the subject and a majority of us became very interested as well.

Ever since I was young, I wanted to be a doctor. I still have aspirations to be a doctor someday, but my plan hasn’t evolved much since my youth. I don’t know what kind of a doctor I want to be, but thankfully I still have some time to figure that out.

Along with the valuable lab experience … I hope that INBRE will give me more confidence. I’m hoping to gain confidence by realizing that the people who are published in journals aren’t so far out of my league. Working beside these people who have been there and done it will help me see that these things are achievable and I could be in their shoes one day.