Peer Leaders are undergraduate students who support their peers in WISCIENCE programs and courses while learning valuable leadership skills. Find out more about Bhanu!
Pronouns: She/her
Major: Neurobiology and Psychology (with a certificate in German)
Peer Leader for: STEM Engagement
Hometown: UAE
If you could choose anyone for a mentor, who would it be?
They already are my mentors, but I’d choose my parents. Everything that I know about life, I learned from them.
What is your favorite place on campus?
Memorial Union
What are your favorite snacks for a study session?
Roasted cashews and grapes
If you could be any animal, what would you be and why?
I would be a ginger cat, just because they seem super agile and whimsical.
What is your hidden talent?
I’ve been told that I’m decent at doing impressions of characters from certain movies and shows.
What is an academic accomplishment that you are proud of?
I’m really proud of the research that I have been able to be a part of at the Waisman Center, with NEUROLand and LAB Lab. In both labs, I have been able to combine my neuroscientific interests with my linguistic interests, and that has been an extremely rewarding experience.
What are you looking forward to about being a peer leader this semester?
I’m really looking forward to making a connection with other STEM students. I feel like it can get pretty lonely out there, especially when you’re still figuring things out, academics-wise and life-wise, so I hope I’ll be able to help with that.
What sparked your interest in STEM?
As I got older, I remember being increasingly baffled by how my brain could process new languages, and kind of compartmentalize them. I would always try to picture what the languages that I have learned look like in my brain. Are they in separate, neat boxes? Or are they all smushed together? Wanting to know the answer to questions like this sparked my interest in STEM.
What is your vision for life after graduation?
My goal is to pursue cognitive neuroscience of language in graduate school. But apart from that, when I envision my life after graduation, I hope to be happy, healthy, curious, surrounded by the people I love, and as excited as ever for the future.
Meet the rest of the WISCIENCE Peer Leaders.
Learn more about the WISCIENCE Peer Leader program.