Her already extensive resume includes work as a policy intern for the American Institute of Physics in Washington, D.C. Her contributions to the college are extraordinary.”īauer has served as a physics tutor at Davidson. “Where she differs from many is in her pragmatic approach to that task. “Like many Davidson students, Julia wants to change the world,” Rigger said. Bauer co-founded the initiative with close friend and roommate Hana Kamran ’23. That includes the Student Government Association’s Davidson Textbook Initiative, which works with the Lula Bell’s Resource Center to ensure that students of all means have equitable access to books and class materials. Rigger said her extensive research about how low-income students access opportunities provided valuable data used to make improvements to existing support structures at the college. She is pushing all the time to deepen her knowledge and pull insight out of whatever topic she’s studying.”īauer served as a student representative for the college’s Educational Policy Committee for three years. You can see the ideas turning over in her head-she gets a little frown line between her eyebrows, which resolves into understanding,” said Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Faculty Shelley Rigger. Professors who’ve taught and conducted research with Bauer describe her insatiable interest in learning. It was a long winter break that year because of COVID, but still…” “I helped, but Julia put in all the work. “It struck me that she was already excellent in physics-how much better would she be when she had the mathematics background?” he said. It’s something he and his colleagues work to ensure doesn’t happen at Davidson. That’s often because of the misperception that someone is born a physicist-or not. He believes too many promising students veer away from physics because they don’t get enough support. He spent hours teaching me the material in several calculus classes and filling in the gaps of what I needed to learn to succeed in the major.”īelloni said he reached out when he realized that she was struggling. “He told me, ‘If you’re willing to do the work, I’m willing to help.’ And he did. Belloni made a deal with me,” Bauer said. She’d always been a top student and while she understood the complicated physics, she was often frustrated by the math equations she didn’t have the background to solve. In fall of 2020, she took a senior-level quantum mechanics class as a sophomore. One of the program’s goals is to prepare students for future advanced research opportunities. That includes those from minority and low-income backgrounds and those who are the first in their families to go to college. RISE is an intensive summer research fellowship program for students historically underrepresented in the sciences. In the summer after her first year, she conducted research with Belloni as part of the college’s RISE program. But an introductory physics class offered a new challenge and sparked her interest in the field. She’d planned to major in political science or history then go to law school. Their home is pet friendly, with two cats and three pugs from a dog rescue group they work with.īauer entered Davidson as a Belk Scholar. She and her mom share an affinity for trail running, once crossing the finish line of a 16-mile race holding hands. “I come from a line of really strong women-I’m very lucky.” She made so many sacrifices to make that happen,” she said. “My mother worked her butt off to make sure I had the best education possible. Julia’s grandmother, Mary Ann Berlin, is a retired nurse who often helped with childcare, drove Julia where she needed to be, and paid for extra-curricular activities.īauer went to private schools thanks to scholarships, her mother’s hard work, and her grandmother’s supportive presence in their lives. Her mom, Louise Schneider, is a social worker who supports children and teenagers. Bauer grew up in Danbury, Connecticut, as the only child of a single mother.
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