Photos by EDWARD LIN/ Daily Bruin Undergraduate Assistant
Michelle Yadegari prepares the spectrophotometer
for use by the students in a Life Sciences 2 lab.
By Sharon Kim
Daily Bruin Contributor
Graduate students aren’t the only ones who conduct a
discussion or lab sections for a class.
This quarter, Michelle Yadegari, second-year psychobiology and
self-described pre-osteopathic medicine student, has been working
as an undergraduate assistant for a Life Science 2 class.
“I like seeing the students’ eyes light up when I
explain something to them,” she said. “Then I know I
helped them understand something.”
Being a UA involves assisting the graduate student Teaching
Assistant during labs and discussions by helping to set up
materials, organize the class and often giving class presentations
on that day’s lab guidelines.
“When you have 18 students in a lab, it’s better to
have more teacher-student interaction by having someone beside the
TA,” Yadegari said. “The smaller instructor-student
ratio helps the lab runs smoothly.”
Every day, Yadegari commutes the 20-minute distance from her
house to campus.
“Being Jewish, it’s hard to find Kosher food at
school, so it’s easier to live at home,” she said.
On Mondays, Yadegari’s day at school starts at 10 a.m.,
when she has her Life Science 4 class.
After attending her physics class right after her life science
class, Yadegari goes to a meeting where all the UAs for the course
work with the TAs to learn that week’s lab and procedures
ahead of time.
During this two-hour meeting, the UAs go through the entire
experiment to understand them fully enough to answer
students’ questions.
 EDWARD LIN/ Daily Bruin Yadegari
(center)helps second-year MCD biology student Sung
Kim and second-year biochemistry student Jeanne
Kim with their experiment. Aycha Erbilgin, a fellow UA and
second-year molecular, cell and developmental biology student,
worked with Yadegari during the meeting.
“My first impression of Michelle was that she was
confident and had a strong personality,” Erbilgin said.
On Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons, Yadegari attends the actual
discussion section conducted by the TA, the class alternating
between a discussion and lab every other week.
Ann Lu, a second-year molecular biology graduate student who
Yadegari works with, said Yadegari is a big help, especially in
organizing the class.
“Michelle really seems to understand the concept and
significance of the labs,” Lu said. “She often does
presentations to the class about the experiment.”
“She also handles a lot of random stuff, like answering
student’s questions,” Lu added.
During this week’s lab, which included an analysis of
lactose and other chemicals involving the use of e-coli bacteria,
Yadegari answered individual questions students had and helped them
with the use of various equipment.
Sung Kim, a second-year MCDB student who asked Yadegari
questions about the procedures of the experiment, said Yadegari
helps him learn the lab fully.
“Even when I don’t read the lab before I come to
class, she helps me understand what’s going on,” he
said.
 EDWARD LIN/ Daily Bruin Tanya Silva
(left) watches as Yadegari prepares the
spectrophotometer.
Yadegari said part of her interests in the sciences can be
attributed to her Jewish upbringing.
“Everything connects from what you learned in the Torah to
everyday life,” she said. “I like finding the same kind
of connection in the sciences.”
She added that she finds it interesting to observe the
connections between what she learned in one class being used in
another.
Yadegari said her religion stresses the idea that when you pick
an occupation, you should choose something to give back to
society.
Yadegari explained that because of Judaism, she realized there
is a master plan that she cannot control.
“Of course you have to put in the effort to achieve, but
you also realize that a large part of everything is controlled by
something else.”
“I just thank God that all the things I’ve prayed
for have turned out to be all right,” she added, “and
not in conflict with my religion.”
During Sabbath, Yadegari is reminded again that she is not in
complete control. On Saturdays, she does not work and attends her
synagogue and spends time with her family.
“It’s sometimes hard because I know that other
people are studying and working on Saturdays too,” Yadegari
said.
She added, however, that because Saturday is the one day in the
week where she can be with her family, observing Sabbath is
important to her
Yadegari said although she has always been interested in
medicine, she wants to explore other possibilities, and intends to
keep teaching as an option.
“Teaching is the only way you can really understand
something and not just memorize it,” she said,
Although she enjoyed volunteering at the emergency room at the
UCLA hospital last quarter, Yadegari does not know whether she
enjoys everything about medicine.
“I think I need more exposure,” she said.
Yadegari worked in a holistic office for the past two years,
doing accounting and secretarial duties. Here, seeing the emphasis
on the body’s natural healing powers and the influence of the
external environment, Yadegari became exposed to alternative forms
of medicine like acupuncture.
Yadegari said one of the reasons she is interested in
osteopathic medicine, which involves using manipulative techniques
in conjunction with conventional medical and therapeutic
procedures, is because it takes a better approach than traditional
medicine.
“Instead of just telling a person, “˜Take two
Tylenols and call me in the morning,’ osteopathic medicine
takes a more preventive approach and tries to find the root of the
problem,” she said.
She also co-edits Ha’am, the Jewish newsmagazine on
campus, which is currently published online.
“Ha’am covers national and communal issues that
relate to Jews, mostly on campus,” she said.
“This year, we hope to have it publicized more to attract
more readers,” she added.
Yadegari, however, does not consider herself journalistically
inclined.
“I just felt like joining Ha’am would be a good way
to meet people,” she said.
Whatever field Yadegari chooses, she said she always wants to
keep one thing in mind.
“In this world, we’re all teachers, and we’re
all students,” she said. “And there is always something
to learn.”