Here you tend to go back into the kind of things that have meaning…As much as I might still miss that whole big city anxiety, angst-type thing, it’s a good feeling to be able to sit back and go, ‘You know, you’re Rachel. This is what you’re from. This is what you should go back and think about.’ Idaho has helped me do that.
Letters, Arts & Social Sciences
I AM Rachel Bonas
“The incoming President of the Idaho Chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers, Rachel Bonas was born and raised in Trinidad. At 18 she moved to Washington, D.C. She attended Norfolk State and Howard University before coming to Idaho.”RACHEL ON IDAHO’S PEOPLE-FIRST ENVIRONMENT
“I’ve spoken with a lot of other Ph.D. candidates at other schools in bigger metro areas and a lot of times they aren’t able to meet with their professors more than once a month. Here, throughout my entire department, it’s normal to chat with your professor at least once a week.
“It’s so laid back here that the professors will actually sit back with you and chat. They make it their business to make sure the students are well taken care of. It may not necessarily have to do with the class or the assignment but they’ll take the time out of their day — even if it’s just five or ten minutes as you run into them in the hallway — to see how you’re doing and chat with you. It’s quite a bit different than the other two universities I’ve gone to — Howard and Norfolk State.”
THE DIFFERENCE HANDS-ON EXPERIENCE MAKES
“The hands-on experience is especially helpful at the Ph.D. level, because at that level you’re trying to go out there and really figure out what it is you want to do. You really need a professor who will sit back with you and let you bounce ideas off of them and get feedback. You can say, ‘Hey, I’ve got an idea. What do you think of this?’ and here, the professors will take the time to do that with you. If I couldn’t talk over with them what I’m thinking, the ideas I’m coming up with, it would definitely make my life more difficult. It’s been so helpful, because I can pretty much just knock on his door and say, ‘Hey, do you have a minute?’ and we’ll just sit and talk for about half an hour.”
RACHEL ON THE IMPORTANT THINGS IN LIFE
“Coming up here has changed my whole outlook. I see things a lot differently now.
“On Saturdays I go to the Co-Op and the Farmers' Market. It’s just entirely different than the old D.C. area where I was — all the hustle-bustle, always going, going, going.
“When I lived in the D.C. area we’d get to work at six o’clock. I’d leave there at three. Then I’d do real estate in the evenings. I was always going, going, going, going. So you got into that frame of mind of, ‘Okay, I’ll eat fast food or something that I’ll just throw into the microwave.’”
“But here you tend to go back into the kind of things that have meaning. Like last Saturday, I just took the whole day to cook home-style dishes. And I realized, ‘Hmm, I haven’t done this in a while.’ And I had to come to Idaho to kind of get back to this?”
“It’s a pleasurable feeling to get back in touch with yourself. As much as I might still miss that whole big city anxiety, angst-type thing, it’s a good feeling to be able to sit back and go, ‘You know, you’re Rachel. This is what you’re from.’ This is what you should go back and think about. Idaho has helped me do that.
“Where I’m from people don’t want to sit around and talk about what’s important on a personal level. But here they do. They’re fascinated by who you are, where you came from, how far you came to be here. Here you just tend to develop a rapport with people. They’re more inquisitive. They want to know about you, where you’ve been.”
HOW HANDS-ON EXPERIENCE LEADS
TO REAL-WORLD SUCCESS
“Because it’s so relaxed and there’s no pressure, you can really get things done.”
“Because you have that ability to touch bases with the professors and talk with them anytime and you can interact so easily with them, a lot of students have a better rapport and they’re able to get a lot more done, and experiment a lot more with their studies and their education.”
“Here you have a lot of students that go out on their own, they do a lot of programming and a lot of experimentation. To me that helps a lot with the learning experience, because especially in the computer science world you really need to do a lot of hands-on experimenting. The students here really do get a lot done. They really do experiment and get out there and try new things and are really able to get into the degree and the computer science.
“A lot of our students actually go out and work for the CIA, the NFS, the FBI — really high-caliber jobs. That’s fantastic, very impressive, especially for a department as small as ours is. The Computer Science Department here definitely has a very solid foundation.”