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Each month, Texas State University President Dr. Kelly Damphousse sits down with faculty members, staff, students, alumni, and community members for a conversation about all things TXST — the past, the present, and the bright future of the university.
Part of the TXST Podcast Network: https://www.txst.edu/podcast-network.html
- Okay, not school, not org, favorite experience at Texas State since your freshman year?
- Everything I've enjoyed has had to do with the Model Arab League.
- Okay. Well you know, sometimes you find your thing, and that's your thing.
- Yeah.
- Right? Sebastian?
- Feels like cop out answer, but research has been mostly my life.
- Today I'm joined by a very special couple of students. So we got Zayna is here. And also we have Sebastian are here as well. And they're actually part of our inaugural Phi Beta Kappa class. And so congratulations on that. It wasn't easy.
- Thank you.
- And we'll come back and talk about that in a second. But let's start off, Sebastian, why don't you tell us a little bit about where you're from, and how you got here. So where'd you grow up?
- So I was born in Puerto Rico.
- Okay.
- San German, Puerto Rico, but then I grew up in Lajas until I was about six and a half years old. And then I moved with my family to Texas, over in El Paso, Texas.
- In El Paso. Okay, very good. That's quite a ways away from Puerto Rico.
- Yeah, the furthest west.
- That's as far as you can. I remember one time when I was very young, driving across the country. And I left Louisiana and got to Texas, and it said like, Galveston, 60 miles, and El Paso, tomorrow, or something like that.
- Yeah.
- It's like, it's so far away, right? And so it's quite a ways out there. So how did you end up coming to Texas State?
- So when I was applying to college in high school, I was sort of just thinking about, well I really wanna do biochemistry. And so I was sort of looking at a list of universities that had biochemistry programs in Texas, 'cause I wanted to stay in Texas for the meantime. And Texas State was naturally on that list. And so I went through the application process, heard back from some places, and Texas State just gave me the best offer. And so I thought, "Oh well, I get pretty good scholarships here. Looks like a really nice campus. Why not come?"
- Zayna, so what was your experience coming here? Why'd you come to Texas State?
- I went to high school at the Woodlands College Park.
- Oh yeah.
- Which, The Woodlands is a bubble, to say the least.
- Are you active in,
- [Zayna] I was,
- Student organizations or anything?
- Yeah, absolutely. So I actually, I kinda asked my mom like, "Can I go to this high school?" Because they had a Japanese language program. And so I spent all four years.
- That's so unusual, because like, what were you thinking about?
- I've always just been a person that likes foreign languages.
- Oh!
- That's kind of guided a lot of what I've done academically, professionally.
- Okay.
- And so I really was into Japanese.
- What caused that?
- My mom. She's like white from Louisiana, but she's a Spanish teacher and she married my dad, who is Jordanian. My dad speaks Arabic. I grew up speaking a little bit of Arabic so I've always just been into different cultures, different languages. And so I was into Korea actually, but they didn't have Korean anywhere. I was like, "Well, I'll learn Japanese. Hey can I learn Japanese?"
- Did you come to tour campus?
- I was looking for a university that had an international relations program.
- Okay.
- And Texas State did. And it also had all the languages I was interested in. It was a perfect distance away from Houston.
- Just far enough, right?
- [Zayna] Exactly.
- Not too close.
- [Zayna] Right.
- Not too far.
- And it was big.
- Sebastian, talk about your experience here at Texas State as a freshman. You came here, did you live on campus?
- I think all students at Texas State were required to spend their first year.
- Yeah, all of 'em are required, but not all of 'em do. So sometimes there people get a, kinda get a waiver, but...
- My first year I was really excited, because I forget the name of the week before all classes officially start. But students living on campus,
- It's like Welcome Week.
- Yeah, yeah. And so there was this one called Bobcats at the Bench, where I started talking to some professors about the research here on campus. And I thought that was really interesting.
- Interesting.
- And the very first week I spoke to the professor that I ended up working for, for the next four years.
- Whoa.
- And so that was an awesome experience.
- So you said that you were looking for a biochemistry program. What brought that on? I mean, I will tell you that as a high school student, I wasn't thinking about biochemistry as a college decision.
- I've always been really interested in biology and chemistry. And so I'm an extremely indecisive person. So I just thought both, well, I combined both, 'cause it gives me exposure to both fields. And so I thought, "Well, I can't make my own mind up yet. I'll just try both at once, see how that goes." And so I thought, "Well I guess I'll try biochemistry program."
- It's interesting that you said you met a professor in Bobcats on the Bench, is that what you called it? It's a new program to me. And that you're doing research for four years now. I think a lot of people know about our striving to become an R1 institution, but don't realize that our undergraduate students are engaged in research all over campus.
- [Sebastian] Yeah.
- Talk a little bit about that.
- So it's actually, in my experience, extremely easy to get involved in research here on campus. There's always professors that are talking to their classes like, "Hey, if you're interested in doing more of this sort of work, then come join my lab." Or like, "We're always looking for students." And so my very first year I was completely terrified. It was my first experience ever working -
- Everybody is. So it's okay.
- So I was a bit nervous at first, but my professor actually assigned me a student who was a bit more senior in the lab, spent a few more years, and so I sort of was helping him out in his own project. And so through him and through the professor, I sort of started building up some experience in the lab, doing some of the common techniques that we do, look at that data, trying to actually work with the chemicals that we work with. And so as I got more and more experienced, started getting a bit more and more independent, until right now, where I'm actually the only person working my project.
- Wow.
- [Sebastian] Right now, and so...
- What is the project? Don't leave us hanging in suspense.
- It's a bit hard to explain, but essentially,
- Yeah, dumb it down for a criminologist like me.
- Our lab looks at proteins. And so we are interested in one particular kind of protein called liquid-liquid phase separating protein. So if you can imagine whenever you mix oil and water, those two separate out.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- And form two different, what we can call phases. And so what these proteins can do are essentially undergo a similar separation to oil and water, if you just leave them out in solution in water. And so what my project is, is trying to look at that behavior of proteins in actual cells and trying to see, and trying to, well, demonstrate whether or not different proteins actually undergo that sort of behavior inside cells. Whether or not they can separate from actual water, and form their own very dense drops within that water.
- Interesting. Fascinating stuff. So Zayna, what about you? What was your experience like being a freshman here?
- Being a freshman? It was super nerdy, super fun. I had probably the best freshman year. I started off in the Model Arab League, like immediately.
- Okay. Yeah.
- And that's, like I spent my free time essentially LARPing diplomats, which was just the funnest thing I could have possibly assumed to do with my free time.
- Again, you guys are so grown up. Like I was not thinking stuff like this when I was your age. Have you noticed like a change in international perspectives here at Texas State since you got here?
- Oh yeah.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- Absolutely.
- In what way?
- Wow, there's just so many different ways in which it's changed. I mean people look at politics I think, in a new way.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Which I hope I'm not projecting.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- 'Cause I know I've definitely learned a lot at Texas State and then I see, I take that knowledge with me everywhere I go, I think. And so I'm always noticing new things. But we have a more politically active community.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- And a international relations-oriented community.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- People are realizing the extent to which international relations shapes our everyday lives.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- And I feel like we're starting to see that. Like not only at Texas State and San Marcos, but just like across Texas, across the United States, just heavily because of what we're seeing on the international stage, in terms of like the wars in Ukraine, Israel, et cetera.
- Yeah, you know, it's interesting, we actually also have more and more international students coming here. So people from like, we have 400 students from Nepal here at Texas State, which seems like a lot. And so a lot more international students coming here, which kind of changes the environment here a little bit.
- [Zayna] Yeah.
- Enriches, I think the classroom experience. But also, yeah, I think access to social media, you're able to see more of what's going on in other countries, and people becoming more aware of what's happening out there, so,
- [Zayna] Yeah.
- It's actually pretty interesting.
- [Zayna] Yeah.
- So what was your favorite freshman experience?
- Model Arab League.
- [Kelly] Yeah, really?
- Yeah, when we went specifically to the Bilateral Convention in Houston.
- Oh yeah.
- That was so much fun for me. I was representing Algeria on the council on Palestinian Affairs. So it was really interesting to pretend I was a diplomat from a country that has such a different foreign policy than the United States and act as that country.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- In a diplomatic setting. And then like winning an award and that just made my whole year.
- I think I, actually, congratulations. I think I actually spoke at the Model Arab League.
- [Zayna] Yeah.
- One time about my terrorism research, and so...
- You did. It was great.
- Yeah, were you there?
- Yeah, I was actually the president then.
- Oh, you were? That's right, that's why I thought! I knew we'd run into each other before.
- We do.
- So another example here of stuff being done outside the classroom research-wise, or experiential-wise, right? And so is that impacting your decision about what you wanna be when you grow up?
- Absolutely. I've sort of accidentally gone down the sort of track towards diplomacy. I ended up interning with the Jordanian embassy at the same time that I was the president of Model Arab League, which was a crazy insightful experience. And then before that I was in Japan, being a "citizen diplomat" through the Critical Language Scholarship. And then the next summer I was in Morocco doing the same thing.
- Holy cow!
- Yeah.
- You've been everywhere!
- Yeah. And it's all like "diplomatic initiatives."
- Yeah. So you think that's what you're gonna be doing?
- Something adjacent to that,
- [Kelly] Yeah?
- Definitely. If not, like under the title specifically of diplomat.
- [Kelly] Okay.
- That would be really cool though.
- What are you gonna be doing, Sebastian, when you graduate?
- So when I graduate I am gonna be a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin Madison.
- That's right, you're gonna be a Badger, right? Yeah.
- In the biochemistry program.
- [Kelly] Okay.
- And so I've just really enjoyed the biochemistry research that I do here on campus, and I thought, "Well I want to continue doing this sort of thing." And I sort of knew that I wanted to be a scientist.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- Ever since I was a kid. But I never really had an idea of what that would look like or like how to become one. And so my time here at Texas State just sort of showed me like what the day-to-day life is, how to actually apply to graduate school, like how the entire way of life sort of works, and so.
- I always think that if a student just comes to Texas State and just takes classes and graduates, that they've missed a lot. Being part of a student organization, get involved in leadership, like you're the president of your organization. Doing a study abroad opportunity, going abroad. Both of you have a lot of international experience already. Doing a research experience, doing an internship. Those are the kinds of things that really will enrich your opportunities to go off and do something special. And when it gets in your resume, it kind of differentiates yourself from the rest of the people who are interviewing for the job and people are looking through your resumes and go, "Oh Morocco, tell me about, I've never been to Morocco. Tell me about your experience there."
- [Zayna] Yeah.
- And so, by the way, how was Morocco?
- It was such a crazy awesome experience. I loved it so much.
- Did you go by yourself?
- It was with an affiliate program of Texas State's.
- Okay.
- ISA, International Studies Abroad.
- Oh yeah, ISA, yeah, yeah, yeah!
- Yeah, it was awesome.
- Have you done study abroad or anything?
- I haven't done any international work, but on the summers, I always do a summer internship at a different university doing research in one of their labs, so.
- So where'd you go?
- I worked at UT Austin for the summer. University of Michigan Ann Arbor, and University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.
- [Kelly] Okay.
- All doing different research projects.
- Oh cool. Did you think about going to those schools at some point?
- Yeah, definitely. I applied to all of them this cycle. But eventually I just settled on University of Wisconsin Madison.
- Yeah. Now you do know it gets cold in Wisconsin.
- Definitely. I interviewed. Well, I visited I think about a month ago. And so snow covered the entire ground. My first time ever seeing that in my life.
- That's right. Puerto Rico, El Paso doesn't have a lot of, definitely didn't have a lot of snow. Let's transition now to Phi Beta Kappa. So Phi Beta Kappa is the most prestigious honor society in America. It's the oldest one as well. And we are now one of five public institutions in the state of Texas that has a Phi Beta Kappa chapter. And you're gonna be part of the inaugural class. How does that feel to be part of that group?
- I wasn't too familiar with Phi Beta Kappa before this past couple of years, but I don't know, it just seems like really good opportunity for the university, and it seems like an honor to be in the very first class.
- Yeah, didn't you tell me earlier that you had been part of like the, when they came to visit campus, you actually met with the site team that visited?
- So as a member of the Honors College, we were sort of sent out an email saying, if you're interested getting by being a representative, then please do so. And so I remember thinking, "Oh wow, the Honors College doesn't really ask you for this sort of thing." I thought, "Well, might as well come by." And so they were telling us about it, saying, just talk about your experience at Texas State. Tell us why. Tell them why you like it. Talk about your experience, what have you done? And so I thought, "Okay, well I've done research a couple of years, I have something to say." And so I came by, learned a little bit about the program, and a bit about the application process and so.
- Yeah. What about you Zayna? What was your experience like? Do you remember? Were you aware of it before?
- Yeah, I was with Sebastian as a part of that initial interview group.
- [Kelly] Okay.
- And that is where I learned about it, honestly. There was a like a meeting, like a briefing before then, where Dr. Galloway walked us through how -
- Told you what not to say.
- Yes, exactly. Don't wear this.
- Yeah.
- Please don't say that.
- Yeah. That's funny.
- I was really excited for it. And ever since then I've been nagging Dr. Galloway, like emailing her every semester, "Hey, have you heard anything? Did we get it?" And then she was like, "Okay, we'll tell you when we find out." And then when we found out, I was so excited.
- So most of the students are involved in the Honors College. Tell me about that experience being in the Honors College.
- The Honors College is great. It's been an amazing support system for me.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- Especially,
- It's almost like a club, right?
- It really is. It's a community in itself. We have like our own little building over by Old Main.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- And it's really cute and fun. There's like a coffee bar. It's just, it's super cute. And the people there are amazing, the classes are amazing. One of the best classes I've taken throughout the time I've been at Texas State has been Talking like TED, where you literally, it's a whole semester. It covers like your communications credit where you just learn how to make a TED Talk.
- Is that right?
- Yeah.
- Talking like TED, that's news to me.
- Yeah, it's really -
- I'm always learning things in this podcast. So are you a part of the Honors College as well, Sebastian?
- And same thing here. I really love all the classes that they offered. I remember my very first year, I was like really nervous to come to college. It was my first time. My high school had a graduate class of like 40 people. And so being at a such a big university,
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- It was like a bit of a shock. And I remember that they offered honors organismal biology, if I remember correctly. And it was like a very nice close-knit community of people that like, just like talk about biology. And so I thought, "Wow, that was great."
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- And so, it really helped me ease into the actual college lifestyle and like just gave me a nice support community to actually get adjusted to it.
- Did you guys work outside of the classroom? Or just full-time students?
- I actually ended up being the Global Campus Ambassador for ISA.
- Okay.
- 'Cause I just loved the program so much. So I was like, "I can get paid to represent this organization?"
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- That would be awesome. So I spend some of my time talking about those international abroad programs. We have like internships abroad, study abroad programs. I always try to get people to do the program I did to Morocco, 'cause it was insane. Morocco is a place like no other.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- And one of the fun perks about being in Morocco is Europe's right there and Ryanair exists, so you can go to Europe for about $40, and I love to pitch that.
- That's the crazy thing about being near Europe and North Africa is that you can jump on a Ryanair plane for like 45 bucks and be in Rome.
- [Zayna] Yep.
- Terribly uncomfortable seats and no suitcase. Like you gotta have a backpack or whatever, but you once you get there, expensive to get there. But once you're there, getting around is super easy. Yeah. So where'd you go?
- Oh, I went to Barcelona with my mom.
- [Kelly] Barcelona, yeah, very good.
- Yeah, my mom actually ended up meeting me in Barcelona and she came back to Morocco with me. And then we spent a little bit of time in Morocco together while I was still actively doing that study abroad.
- Did you go to Sagrada Familia?
- Sagrada Familia, yeah. We did go to the Sagrada Familia. Can I say it was overrated? Is that probably -
- Overrated?
- Yeah.
- I thought it was overwhelming, so yeah.
- It's so big.
- Yeah. So big.
- Yeah!
- Well, because I had never heard of it before, and we were visit, we have a study abroad group there. And Beth and I were visiting study abroad groups in Europe and we went there and said, we're gonna go to this place. And I said, "Okay." And they said, "Have you ever heard of Gaudi before?" And I said, "Well, I've heard of the term." And they said, "No, the guy." I'm not a very cultured person. And they said, "Well, he started designing this church over 100 years ago, and he actually died early on, and the city just kept kind of building it based on his design." And I got up the subway I think, and I kind of, I said, "Where's the place?" They said, "It's right there." Like, holy cow, it's so big.
- Yeah.
- But I thought inside of it was just, it doesn't feel church-like. It just feels like an incredible piece of architecture. But you, Sebastian, is your research, you get paid for some of that? Or is it all just volunteer?
- So my very first year at Texas State, I was a learning assistant for organismal biology.
- Okay. Yeah.
- And so ever since then, I was a member of the U-RISE program here at Texas State.
- [Kelly] Oh.
- And so that program is dedicated to helping undergraduate students get involved in research and part of that is supporting them by getting 'em a stipend. So as a member of U-RISE for the past three years, I've been getting a stipend that supports me and means I really don't need to have a job right now. And so I've just been doing research, not really full-time, but I've been doing research like every week the past three years, and so...
- Okay. Not school, not org. Favorite experience at Texas State since your freshman year?
- Everything I've enjoyed has had to do with the Model Arab League.
- Okay. Well, sometimes you find your thing and that's your thing.
- Yeah.
- Right? Sebastian?
- Feels like a cop out answer, but research has been most of my life the past few years. I think that I really love walking down Sewell Park and actually like,
- Sewell Park? A lot of people mentioned Sewell Park, yeah.
- I remember like the very first time I came here, I just thought I'll have a walk around. And so I went to Sewell Park. There's like a little bridge,
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- Going over the river. And I took a photo of like the river and the plants growing in it. And I thought it was, "This is like the nicest photo I've ever taken." It's like actual photography.
- Sometimes the weather is like the last couple days, it's been like perfect. And you go out there and the students are really enjoying it. And do you guys ever go there, like between classes or anything, or the weekend, or?
- I walk from my apartment.
- Yeah.
- Pretty often just to soak it all in, yeah.
- Now we've got something kind of special. We ask our listeners to submit a question and I'm gonna ask you to ask me the question. I don't know what's on there.
- Okay.
- And I've not seen the question.
- All right. So if you could teach one course on campus, what would it be?
- Oh, it's actually pretty easy. I haven't taught since I came here, but when I was the president, actually, it was called chancellor at Arkansas State. I always taught Introduction to Sociology. And I taught that for years when I was at University of Oklahoma. And I teach it from the perspective of being a student. So I think it's, I think you can learn stuff, if you can memorize stuff, but it doesn't sink in as well, is if you can apply it to your life. And so I teach sociological perspectives using college and the transition from high school to college as the model for it. And I really mourn the fact that I'm not able to teach. The school's so big, and there's so much stuff going on. But someday I hope to get back in the classroom and teach my Introduction to Sociology class. I love teaching it because I think sociology has a lot to teach people about how, the central theme is that we learn from each other, we influence each other, and they influence us. And it's often not like purposeful, like you're being influenced without knowing it and you're influencing other people without knowing it. Favorite class. How about you?
- Oh my gosh. I'd say definitely the most iconic class I've taken has been the diplomacy seminar.
- [Kelly] Okay.
- With Ambassador Oliver Del Cid.
- [Kelly] Okay.
- We just added a diplomacy minor,
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- In the Center for International Studies. And so learning about diplomacy from-
- From an ambassador.
- From an ambassador.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- And Texas State alum.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- Was crazy.
- That's fantastic.
- [Zayna] Yeah.
- Sebastian, favorite class?
- It's a tough one, but I think I have to go with my genetics class that I took as a sophomore. It just felt like in your first couple of years at Texas State, the intro biology classes and intro chemistry classes don't really have a very whole lot to do with each other.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- I feel like genetics was the first one to really talk about the role of proteins in biological systems and talk a bit more about some of the chemistry aspects, or some of the more biochemistry aspects. So it was like kinda like my first biochemistry class before I took an actual biochemistry class.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- And I thought it was such a cool class.
- Thank you for asking the question. Thank you for joining me on the podcast, and thank you for joining us on the podcast as well. I always love these opportunities to learn more about Texas State from the people who are making it all happen here. Thank you for joining us. Until next time, States Up, everyone.