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Prepared for the Best
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
-Aristotle
Lea Hogsett seems to have taken this lesson to heart. In every facet of her life, from academics to athletics, she has prepared to be the very best. Such dedication has enabled Lea to pursue a double major in Oxbridge Molecular Biology and Math, conduct academic research for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), play violin for the Liberty Symphony Orchestra, and even compete with the Homerton College Rowing Team in Cambridge, England.
When asked how she developed the discipline to do so much so well, Lea answers: “I never had to work as hard as I’ve had to here [at Jewell].”
Lea has forged her path with a combination of hard work and passion for helping others.
When she was growing up in Baldwin, Kansas, dentists discovered that Lea was born without lateral incisors, the adult teeth on either side of the two front teeth. Her personal experience with oral healthcare, ranging from bridges and caps to bone grafting, led to an intimate knowledge of dentistry.
“Dentistry is something I became very interested in as a profession,” she said, flashing her now-perfect smile.
But a passion for dental health did not emerge until after she had to give her retainer, including front teeth, back to the dentist prior to a bone grafting surgery. “Not having my front teeth for three days was a really traumatic experience,” she said, describing how self-conscious she felt during the experience. “I realized that people consider dentistry to be an aesthetic thing, but I think it’s a much more important part of medicine than people give it credit for.”
After visiting literally dozens of colleges, Lea felt a connection at Jewell.
“Every time we went on a family vacation, we would stop by every college we passed,” she remembered. “My parents kept saying they wanted me to walk onto a campus and just love it. That’s the experience I had when I came to Jewell.”
At Jewell, Lea discovered how to think and learn, but more importantly, the value of preparation. A violin player in both high school and college, Lea said: “In high school, I didn’t want to practice. It wasn’t until college that the practicing became one of my favorite things – as a stress-reliever, or as a late-night study break. The more I loved practicing, the better I got. So then it was easier to practice.”
It paid off. Lea is the first violinist for the Liberty Symphony Orchestra – something she says would not be possible for a non-music major at many other schools.
“I’m not a naturally talented violinist. For me, it’s all about practice. I think that goes for everything I do. I take at least twice as long as anyone I know to write a paper. You put the time in so you can produce a result that you’re proud of.”
And she does, whether working on her Oxbridge tutorials, practicing the violin, or rowing with her teammates at Cambridge.
Such dedication has propelled Lea on her incredible journey. After studying in Cambridge, England, Lea will move to the American city of the same name in the fall to study at Harvard University’s School of Dental Medicine.
There is no question that Lea is prepared to study at Harvard. The dentistry program focuses on research, a good fit for Lea, who spent a summer at the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research in Bethesda, Maryland.
What’s the secret to a journey from small-town Kansas to Jewell, Cambridge, and now Harvard? It all comes back to Lea’s motto: “practice, practice, practice.”
“I guess I’m a little bit of a perfectionist,” she said modestly.
It seems that in this case, practice does make perfect.
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