Lina Lin

Lina Lin might be found at the hospital pharmacy at which she volunteers spiking IV bags, or gliding her fingers across piano keys as the melodies of romantic-era composers resonate across the concert hall. Maybe she is hiking on slick rocks of national park trails in the Mid-west. Considering Lina’s packed schedule and wide variety of interests, the permutations are infinite.

Though she enjoys a variety of exotic diversions, as a Doctor of Pharmacy major Lina is a highly ambitious student. She engaged in pharmaceutical research while in high school at the highly-esteemed Garcia Materials Research Science and Engineering Center at Stony Brook University. Her work was honored with many prestigious awards, most notably being one of the fifteen national finalists in the BioGENEius Challenge and a Semi-Finalist in the revered Siemens Science and Technology Competition.

Lina maintains a near-perfect GPA even as she completes a rigorous pharmacy curriculum while balancing two jobs. During the school year, she works as a microbiology lab assistant and as a pharmacy technician. She is already a certified pharmacy technician accredited by the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy.

During the summer, Lina volunteered in the Pharmacy Department at North Shore LIJ-Syosset Hospital. In spite of her demanding study and work schedule, Lina is highly active on-campus and in the community. Selected to be a DNY Peer Leader, she mentors freshmen unfamiliar with college life and New York City.  She is the President of the Chamber Music Society, and plays piano and violin. She also serves as Secretary of the campus Drug Information Association. In whatever free time she has left, Lina plays Intramural softball and tennis, and performs traditional Chinese fan dance.

For Lina, the Honors Program is the shining pearl of St John’s. She has found the courses stimulating and energizing. “Honors courses are a valuable opportunity,” she asserts.  “These classes enable you to connect with professors on a much more personal level and radically alter your methods of creative and practical thinking. Dr. Robert Forman, the Honors Program Director, cares deeply for his students and always fervently advocates for them. It was daunting starting at a bustling school like St John’s, but Dr. Forman went above and beyond to do everything possible to help me succeed,” Lina recalls.

The Honors Program is virtually a VIP pass to everything cultural New York City has to offer. Lina particularly enjoys gratis tickets to the New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center. Want a private tour of the Metropolitan Museum of Art? Attend the walking tour led personally by Dr. Forman. Lina exclaims, “Dr. Forman’s knowledge is so vast! I have lived in the metropolitan area my entire life, but the amount of history Dr. Forman endowed in the few hours of a walking tour was many-fold more than I ever knew.”

Lina feels the Honors Program immensely enriched her time at St John’s. “I have developed so many relationships and connections through the program,” she says. “At the Annual Softball games, Tea & Sympathies and Uncommon Hours, I have met so many people who share my interests and passion for learning. I truly feel privileged to be a student in the Honors Program. It is a life-changing opportunity not to be missed.”