"I’ve always balanced activities and academics, so I've been comfortable doing it at Bates. If you’re bored, you’re not taking advantage of what Bates has to offer," says Sonija Parson '06 of Washington, D.C.  Parson works as a senior admissions fellow, teaches Pilates classes and is active in the Bates Investment Club, Women of Color and Latinos Unidos.

Parson grew up on Capitol Hill and attended private school in elite Georgetown.  "There is a great cultural difference between D.C. and Maine, too, but coming to school up North has not been that difficult," says the women's and gender studies major.

A four-year member of the women's varsity lacrosse team, she eagerly anticipates this year's pre-season being held in Baltimore, just up the road from her hometown. "Because of financial reasons, my family has never had the opportunity to see me play lacrosse for Bates, so while we are there as a team during February break, they'll get the chance to see what I can do."

Parson traded her fall 2004 lacrosse training to spend a junior semester in Cuernavaca, Mexico, where she did an internship in a women's health clinic, took four classes and trained on her own. Since summer 2005, she has intermittently returned to Cuernavaca to apprentice as a midwife in preparation for her yearlong senior thesis, an investigation of the value of midwifery in slowing Mexico's increasing rate of Caesarean births.