Fascinated by clues, evidence, and the human brain, Ciara seeks to deepen her expertise at Explo and get closer to her dream of working in the field of criminal science.
When I was six, I started watching Criminal Minds and I thought it was really fun. I remember I liked to investigate things and play strategy and logic games. I thought it would be cool to work with things like that. Then I looked up forensic science, and when I was about eight or nine, I thought that should be my job. In history class, we were learning about the First World War, and in science, we were learning about how people think and how the brain works. I thought that it was really cool when I connected these two things. I want to be an FBI agent or a forensic scientist, so I am taking Criminal Psychology and Art for Graphic Novels. In order to be a forensic scientist, you have to take criminal psychology. And I want to minor in art, so the graphic novels course is helping with that.
I read science books and forensic textbooks and stuff. The college I want to go to is in Buffalo, New York, and it has a really good forensic science program, but you can also be an intern for your second year there. [My favorite thing in forensics is] gel electrophoresis, which is basically separating DNA strands. And I like the action of helping the police with the suspect and help them understand why they did what they did. DNA finding and fingerprints and stuff like that are interesting.
[In my Criminal Psychology class] we watch a lot of experiments to see how people work and how they react in a group setting: if they copy their actions or not. Tomorrow we are actually doing a forensic science unit. But we are generally learning how criminals work, why they do what they do, and where criminal behavior comes from, so if you want to be an FBI agent, you need to know all of these things to find and understand them [criminals].
Mari Armei