Nov. 9, 2009 | Nov. 9, 2009 | A summer research internship hooked Lee Ann MacMillan-Crow, Ph.D., on science. Even almost failing a neuroscience course her first semester of graduate school did not deter her.

The associate professor of pharmacology in the UAMS College of Medicine said the academic adversity paid off in guiding her career path and solidifying her determination. She now runs her own research lab at UAMS studying causes of kidney dysfunction following transplantation and serves as director of the Interdisciplinary Toxicology Graduate Program in the UAMS Graduate School.

MacMillan-Crow discussed her experiences during the ninth annual Career Day for Biomedical Sciences hosted by the UAMS Graduate School on Oct. 29. The event drew 115 attendees from 14 colleges in three states that included undergraduates, graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. The event brings together speakers and presentations to discuss available career and education options.

“There are a lot of things I had to persevere to get here but I truly enjoy what I am doing,” MacMillan-Crow said, describing a day that sometimes starts with answering e-mails from home and includes mentoring graduate students, planning and troubleshooting experiments, and planning new avenues of research.

A basketball player at Judson College, she said her interest in graduate education was prompted by a 10-week summer research fellowship at the University of South Alabama. Still, nearly failing the neuroscience course her first semester almost derailed her plans.

“I really started to question myself,” she said, especially when a professor counseled her that “what you really should be doing is coaching.”

That made her more determined to succeed, she said, first earning her master’s degree followed by her doctorate in pharmacology.

She also was challenged when her first request for a research project grant (R01) from the National Institutes of Health was rejected. On her second attempt with a different topic, the grant was approved.

MacMillan-Crow has been on the UAMS faculty for seven years. She said she likes being her own boss and having a flexible schedule, which are important for her ‘other’ role as wife and mother of two children.

However, she said, managing a lab requires a great deal of oversight and long-term planning. She is responsible for obtaining funding, generating a lab budget, handling graduate student training, monitoring the ongoing research and developing new research ideas within her laboratory.

She said drive and persistence are necessary both in graduate school and in operating a laboratory.

“You’re going to fail sometimes. You’ve just got to keep going and really believe in what you are doing,” she said.

Other Biomedical Career Day speakers discussed the life of an undergraduate faculty member, working in drug development for a pharmaceutical company and working in an FBI lab.