Meet Your Alumni: How Charis Alexander’s Crafton Hills College experience opened doors to med school

Publish Date: Aug. 10, 2024

Charis Alexander cannot talk about her time at Crafton Hills College without talking about its student clubs.

When the now 18-year-old first stepped onto the Yucaipa-based college’s campus four years ago, student clubs welcomed her with open arms.

“Having that grounding and community when everything was shut down [because of the Covid pandemic], they were a big stress reliever and motivator for me,” said the Beaumont resident. “It was what I needed – self-care by building community through balance, boundaries, and volunteer work.”

Alexander was happy to reflect on her time at Crafton when asked, one that started when she was just 14. She then enrolled in one class to get a leg up on her college requirements and get a taste of college life by “dipping her toes into the water.” Her hard work paid off when she graduated with an associate degree in art history in 2021.

After graduating from Crafton, Alexander transferred to the University of Southern California, where she earned a bachelor’s in neuroscience just a few weeks ago. In the fall, she’ll begin her med school studies through the USC-Caltech MD-PhD Program, which provides “students with an enviable range of cross-disciplinary research opportunities” (https://keck.usc.edu/md-phd-program/).

You may wonder how Alexander went from art history to neuroscience to medicine?

“When I first started at Crafton, I was thinking about going into science because I was very ‘science focused,’” she explained. “But when talking to my counselors, they encouraged me to think of the opportunities available at Crafton and I started thinking about what else I loved doing. That ended up being humanities and history.

“I eventually began studying neuroscience because I liked human behavior, and history provides a different angle of human behavior over time,” Alexander continued. “So, I was able to discover a new side to what I was passion about, and I don’t think I would have been able to do that had I started at a four-year university.”

For those looking to have the kind of success Alexander experienced, her biggest piece of advice is to get invested and get connected.

“Take the opportunity you have with the incredible support system available at Crafton to start something new and to create something new,” she said. 

Embark on your own Crafton Experience today at the College website: craftonhills.edu.