Career Pathways: MEET Kelly McCollum, Yellow Scope Co-Founder

 What is your background and what brought you to Portland?I have an MPH in Epidemiology and Biostatistics from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and a BS in Biology. Prior to starting Yellow Scope, I worked in biomedical research (10+ years) conducting data analyses for publication in peer-reviewed science and medical journals and overseeing the operations of large-scale biomedical research studies. I also have over a decade of formal and informal teaching experience including teaching middle school science, graduate-level biostatistics, and tutoring in math. I moved to Portland from Philadelphia with my husband and 3 children in 2008 because my husband had a job opportunity and we wanted to be closer to the family on the West Coast.  What influenced you to pursue a degree in science? I’ve always been very curious and wanted to know how things worked! From the time I was pretty young, around 1st or 2nd grade, I used to play math teacher with my younger brother and sister. At school, I’d ask my teacher for extra worksheets. Then, at home, I’d pull out the chalkboard, teach lessons to my younger siblings, then assign and grade their worksheets. I loved math so much, I wanted to share it with them! When I reached high school, I chose mostly math and science classes as electives because they were most interesting to me. I started college as a psychology major because I wanted to help people. However, I missed the sciences so much, so I switched my major to Biology. I pursued an MPH in Epidemiology and Biostatistics for two major reasons: (1) I appreciate that public health integrates science, math, as well as social & behavioral sciences; (2) I chose to focus on epidemiology because I wanted to understand how to design and conduct research studies to minimize bias. I was drawn to biostatistics because I appreciate the clarity of quantitative information; I also like telling stories using data and graphs.  Tell us about your current role and what led you to this position. Did you switch career paths at any point? I’m Co-Founder of Yellow Scope where we make science kits for 8-12-year-olds. Our mission is to help close the gender gap in science, technology, engineering, and math. My business partner, Marcie Colledge – who is also a scientist, and I met volunteering at our children’s school running family STEM programs for 7 years. We quickly realized our shared passion for science, education, and closing the gender gap in STEM and decided to form a company with the mission of helping to narrow this gap. Hence, Yellow Scope was born!I switched career paths many times - partially because it took me a while to figure out what I wanted to do and partially because of life circumstances. Though I always loved math and science, for some reason, I never saw myself as a scientist. I also really wanted to help people and didn’t understand that scientists absolutely do this. As a child, I didn’t know anyone who loved science as I did, so I didn’t have any role models. After spending half of my 20s volunteering as a teacher in inner-city middle schools in Brooklyn & South Bronx, NY, and in Belize City, Belize, I eventually bumped into public health while working as an interviewer on a research study about pregnancy loss at the University of Pennsylvania. When the project manager moved to another job, the study Principal Investigator taught me to generate study reports using SPSS I was immediately hooked on statistics. I eventually went to graduate school at Johns Hopkins to study epidemiology and biostatistics because I was drawn to the quantitative side of research. I was also admitted into a PhD program at Hopkins but needed to start working after volunteering for 5 years then earning my masters, so I declined the spot, which I sometimes still regret. After graduate school, I worked in biomedical research for over a decade at multiple medical schools in Philadelphia, studying race-ethnic differences in preterm birth. I only left this awesome job because, in 2008, my husband and I moved with our 3 children to Portland to be closer to family.   What future goals do you have for your career?I’d love to continue to grow Yellow Scope by developing new products. I also want to help expand science education in public elementary schools. Many public elementary schools don’t have dedicated science teachers, whereas most private schools do. Since science is so specialized, it’s difficult and very time-consuming for non-science elementary school teachers to prepare and teach science lessons. I’d love for Yellow Scope to be an integral resource for these teachers by offering a solid curriculum, materials, and experiments to make teaching experiment-based, hands-on science in elementary school easy, fun, and engaging for the teacher and students.  Do you have any advice for women who are pursuing careers in science?If you love it, pursue it and try to seek out mentors! I’ve loved science and math my entire life but never thought I was “the type” to become a scientist or mathematician. I’m a friendly, compassionate person who likes helping others. I thought this somehow precluded me from being a scientist…! I also didn’t grow up knowing or seeing many scientists, so I didn’t understand what was out there. I now understand that there are many ways to practice science and many different roles. What are some challenges you faced along the way?I’d say my two biggest two challenges were not believing in myself and having limited finances, which made it more difficult to pursue some of my goals.   What impact are you making or would you like to make in your field?My biggest goal is to help kids believe in themselves – to help them know they can achieve what they want if they put their minds to it. I also want to help ensure that all kids develop sound critical thinking skills rooted in science and data, regardless of what career path they decide to pursue.   What is a fun fact about you that not many people know?I’m obsessed with spreadsheets and love to stand up paddleboard in the ocean.  Author BioKylia Ahuna is originally from Fort Collins, Colorado, and moved to Portland in the fall of 2019. She received her bachelor’s degree in neuroscience at the University of Colorado Boulder and is currently a research assistant in a lab at Oregon Health and Sciences University. Kylia is also passionate about making research more accessible to the public and, as such, she is pursuing a graduate degree in Science Writing. She is excited to be a part of the Women in Science organization and looks forward to sharing stories of women in STEM fields through this blog series!