April 24, 6:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.

Through her past four years at Fairfield, Amanda has immersed herself into a myriad of extracurricular activities and academic projects.  As a biology major, she performed various projects, such as a study on student health and the harmful bacteria present within residential halls and academic buildings, and participated in an academic seminar on the biology of cancer which dedicated some of the course load on the study of breast cancer.

Her academic background in science and dream to attend medical school to become an OB/GYN took her to Myanmar this past December on a medical mission trip.  While there, she delivered free medical attention to impoverished Burmese women and children alongside doctors and fellow students.  A more notable moment of her trip involved the identification of a large tumor in the right breast of a young Burmese woman and the subsequent raising of money from the students involved to pay for the excision of her tumor.

Her passion for women’s health and equality spans from the classroom to the court as a Fairfield University Volleyball team member.  While on the team, she participated in programs such as National Women in Sports Day and Girl Scouts of America to promote gender equality within the sports world.  Amanda is also involved in the Fairfield University Glee Club, and has repeatedly participated in campus events such as Hunger Clean-Up (captain), Relay for Life (captain), and the Color Orange Ball.

She is currently working on her Women’s Studies Capstone, with partner, Sara Hoegen, which focuses on the choices that women must make when feeding their newborn children.  It is titled “To Breastfeed or to Resign: the Correlation Between Maternity Leave and Breastfeeding Efficacy”.  Her future plans include more medical mission trips to Haiti and Myanmar, acquiring a Master’s in Microbiology and Infectious Disease, and attending medical school to become an OB/GYN.