A healing journey: Future naturopath wins Honors Mickel Scholarship

After discovering naturopathy, Jasmine Pearson found she “loved living naturally and experienced so much healing” and began her journey to follow this passion.

Pearson, a biology major with a Spanish minor, finds all parts of biology fascinating but had no idea where this path would take her when she began college. She explained, “As I continued, I started pursuing naturopathic medicine, and I fell in love with it.” She expressed how she’s excited to pursue this niche career path “to help other people who are in the same boat as I was before I discovered naturopathy.”

In describing naturopathy, Pearson explained, “Instead of treating symptoms of the issue, you figure out what’s actually going on in your body and fix it naturally with supplements and dietary changes.” 

The benefits of naturopathy are that even though it may be a longer process, it’s a lifelong improvement, and people do not get stuck on prescriptions or suffer from prescription side effects.

The beginning

Before this scholarship recipient’s journey truly started at UW-Eau Claire, Pearson toured the campus and said, “I liked the biology program, I liked the Spanish minor and it checked all of my academic boxes and everything I was looking for in a school.” She was thrilled with UWEC’s study abroad program, the tuition cost compared to other schools and being “far away but close enough” to her hometown of Apple Valley, Minnesota.

Pearson was one of the few selected to be in the Honors Fellowship program during her freshman year. With a group of freshmen, she worked on a service project about the quality of food on campus. She recalled, “It can be overwhelming coming in freshman year, but this project showed me it’s possible to pursue something that helps others.” She went on to say, “How you find an issue, fix it and gather data was a process that was a lot of fun.” 

Leadership across campus

Pearson is very proud to not only have earned one scholarship, but two. This year she is the recipient of a Biology Scholarship and the Mickel Honors Scholarship. The Mickel Honors Scholarship is named after Dr. Ron Mickel, the founding director of the Honors Program and a history professor who left a lasting impact on UWEC. 

Pearson explained, “To get these scholarships I had to put in a lot of work to maintain my GPA, was involved in many extracurriculars, and I feel like these scholarships sum up my accomplishments.” She’s grateful for these scholarships as she described, “I felt I had something to show from all my work, not just my transcript.” Not only did Pearson work hard academically, but she also expanded her involvement into other interest areas. 

Pearson has been an integral part of many extracurriculars. She’s part of a women’s Bible study group, and she also serves as a peer academic coach and tutor in the Academic Skills Center. She has enjoyed doing intramural sports with friends during her time here and has been on the club tennis team for three years. This year, Pearson is on the club tennis team’s board as the social media manager, along with having other responsibilities.

In addition to a leadership position through tennis, Pearson emphasized her role in the Biology Club. She’s been a part of the club for three years. Last year she was vice president and this year she's president. Being in this leadership position, she made sure she was “being the leader I want to see.” Through this role, Pearson expressed, “I honed in on my leadership skills. For a while, I was much more passive and was told what to do, but now I’m stepping into, embracing and developing leadership skills.” The Biology Club has connected her to professors, resulting in two of them writing her letters of recommendation for medical school.

Her connections in biology also led her to research with Dr. Nora Mitchell, associate professor of biology. Mitchell had previously completed a research project on plants in Putnam Park, so Pearson expanded upon that research. She explained, “I spent about six months researching the Native American medicinal uses of the plants native to Putnam Park. Many herbal remedies stem from Native American practices, and I think it’s important to acknowledge that.”

The Honors Program

The Honors Program has been a “breath of fresh air” in Pearson’s busy schedule. She emphasized how she may have “piles of homework in other classes, but with Honors, I’ve always been excited to read and discuss the topics." She continues, “I’ve never been stressed or worried about an Honors course.” One of the eye-opening courses Pearson took was the Woman Composers in Western Music course, taught by Dr. Alex Woods. With a musical background beginning at the age of 5 in piano, violin and choir, she already had an arsenal of knowledge surrounding music. What she was not aware of, however, was the number of women composers in history. There would be famous male composers, whose music she’d played and listened to for years, who had wives who were accomplished composers. “It’s courses like these that set Honors apart,” Pearson said.

“Professors want you to learn about the topic, interact with it and form your own opinions on it,” Pearson says while discussing her favorite aspects of these unique courses. She’s thankful for these courses as she’s been able to meet more people in a classroom setting who are not in her major and minor department classes. Pearson also feels Honors “is a great support system. The Honors staff want you to succeed and will work with you if you need help.” Her biggest takeaways have been that Honors works to “grow you as a person and push your minds in other ways.”

Future plans

Pearson will be attending the Canadian College of Naturopathic Medicine in Toronto post-graduation. Students arrive at CCNM from varying backgrounds, including conventionally trained doctors, parents, people her age and people from all over the world. Her Honor courses prepared her to excel in this diverse environment: “Discussions in Honors courses opened my mind more and have allowed me to think about things from other people’s perspectives.” Pearson went on to say, “The interesting intellectual conversations with people that have very different academic backgrounds have been great practice for the real world interacting with people of varying backgrounds.”

As Pearson starts this new chapter after graduation, she’s looking forward to fulfilling her dream of being a bilingual naturopathic doctor. Not only has she been greatly impacted by the Honors Program during her college journey, but the Honors Program and university have been impacted by her, through her dedication to her passions and leadership roles.

Written by Eve Quick, UW-Eau Claire student and University Honors Program intern.