Emma Erwin '11

However, her education was interrupted by a traumatic experience with sexual assault that brought her back to Houston so she could focus on her own health and well-being. During her time home, Emma reconnected with the St. John's field hockey coaching staff—including Craig Chambers '81, Jack Daniel '81, and Marty Thompson '91—with whom she shared her story of strength and bravery. Marty recalled that Emma "could have kept her story a secret, but she was brave, honest, and most importantly vulnerable with three men, and she shared her story so we could use it to protect other girls."

As part of her journey, Emma continued to look for the wisdom to be gained through pain and struggle. Already a place of peace, the outdoors appears to be Emma's calling and she channeled her energies by going into the wilderness. Emma took a gap year to complete a semester with the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) in Patagonia. NOLS as an organization believes that anyone can be a leader and their aim is to nurture leaders who know how to live responsibly in the wilderness and teach others to do the same. Emma's experience with them was so formative that every summer, she was leading expeditions in Alaska and then continued her work with them after college in Alaska, Patagonia, Washington, Wyoming, Arizona, and New Zealand. Among many of her students in the program were members of the US Military, including Navy SEALS. About this work, she said "It’s time for me to work with other people - to help them explore the outdoors and test their limits!" Even through a two-year stint with Teach for America (TFA), where she taught high school math and special education, Emma's journey with NOLS continued. Every summer between classes, she returned to work for NOLS and after her TFA commitment ended, she traveled to New Zealand for a full year with them.

During many of her trips with NOLS, Emma found herself working in remote, glaciated environments as a mountaineering instructor, which prompted her to apply for graduate school in hopes of applying her physics background to understand more about climate change and glaciology. Now, Emma is a PhD student at the University of Maine School of Earth and Climate Sciences, studying glaciology and geophysics. Her research focus involves using ground-penetrating radars to measure ice dynamics at ice core sites. The results of her research helps to inform selection and analysis of deep ice core projects, which provide incredible records of earth’s past climate over tens of thousands of years (in Alaska) to hundreds of thousands of years (in Antarctica). Emma shared that she loves that this work allows her to combine her interests—her experience as a mountain guide has allowed her to lead scientific expeditions on Denali in Alaska, and now in Antarctica; her background in physics has given her a solid foundation to utilize complex radar systems to understand the mysteries of ice dynamics; and she is still able to tap into her experience in education by mentoring younger graduate and undergraduate students on field work expeditions during the summer in Alaska and Canada.

Reflecting on her time at St. John's, Emma shared that "SJS has had a huge impact on my life – it’s hard to say otherwise from a school that shaped me from my 5th birthday until my 18th." Academically, St. John's taught her how to excel at school through critical thinking and writing skills that have served her well in academic endeavors. She shared that her teachers and coaches form SJS affected her life through their classroom lessons, sideline chats, comments on assignments, or conversations in the years since. She gave a special shoutout to several teachers for their influence on her St. John's experience, saying "I’ll always remember talking with Marty Thompson '91 in 7th grade about the civil rights movement; running around Big Bend with Craig Chambers '81 in 8th grade; learning from Bobbi Oldfield in 9th grade that it’s even more rewarding working to understand something that you don’t quite get the first time. I’ll always appreciate that Dwight Raulston '71 would let me work out multivariable calculus problems under a tree in 12th grade, rather than requiring I stay the classroom; that Roxie Allen showed me there is a place for fun creativity in science in her organic chemistry class." St. John's has given Emma a "rock-solid" academic foundation and a community of incredibly strong lifelong friends—in both former classmates and teachers.

Emma's story is inspirational to say the least and in Marty's words "like the geology she is interested in, the stress and pressure reshaped her molecules and not only didn't break her, but turned her into a diamond."