Africa Trip Winner Profile: Bryant Shannon
Meet Bryant Shannon, a rising junior at the University of Florida in Gainesville, co-leader of one of the top schools in the ONE Campus Challenge, and one of five students going on the first-ever OCC trip to Africa in July.
Originally from Maine, Bryant now studies Biological Engineering and Public Health at the University of Florida. Eventually, he hopes to become a physician. “My interests reside in combating modern plagues that hold back developing nations,” he explained in his application for the trip. “The reason why Malaria kills so many people is because there are not qualified medical professionals with the appropriate resources to diagnosis and treat sick individuals before it is too late.”
Although he has never been to Africa, Bryant has volunteered time in small communities in Costa Rica, Guatemala, El Salvador, Belize and Nicaragua, where he helped raise awareness about the issues of extreme poverty, HIV/AIDS, clean water, and respiratory illnesses attributable to open-air cooking.
A ONE member since 2008, Bryant was recruited by Campus Leader Andrea Morley to help start up U-F’s OCC chapter, and has worked extensively with the University of Florida’s ONE group as well as in the local community of Gainesville. As Vice President of OCC-UF, Bryant helped his team win our Halloween Challenge as well as Photo of the Week honors. U-F squeaked in to the Top 10 Schools competition by a narrow margin, but proved with their amazing final project that they belonged there — ultimately finishing as a distinguished runner-up. That makes U-F one of the top 3 schools in the nation in the OCC for 2008-9, and is a powerful testament to Bryant’s strength as a co-leader of the chapter.
Bryant’s project for the Africa trip was a Powerpoint presentation. Download and check it out, here.
Congratulations to Bryant and the other Africa trip winners!
-Emily Stivers
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