Christina Brady ’07

I grew up in Sparks, Nevada, until I was 11. My dad was born there and knew it as the farmland it used to be, but after a shooting at our local grocery store, which made its way across the street to his aunt’s front yard, he moved us to a small town in Idaho. My dad was an inside journeyman wireman from age 15 to retirement. His dad was also an electrician. Best I can remember, my mom worked for the casinos and then America West airlines until she was 40, and has worked a wide variety of jobs since, including a summer in Glacier National Park.

I went to a private school in Idaho for seven years before Cornell; it was 36 miles from our house and my graduating class was 19 students. For nearly five years now, I have lived in Boise, Idaho, in what is called the North End. It’s hard to imagine being anywhere other than nestled in the foothills and close to downtown, but I often miss many things about Iowa.

Cornell contributed to my life in a number of ways, and, as the years pass, it is apparent that Cornell truly is a unique opportunity that other college graduates I speak to have not experienced. The total immersion in a residential campus and the One Course At A Time program’s flexibility and opportunity do not compare; reflecting with fellow Cornell alumni, it is most often the relationships that were formed that have greatly impacted many of us. In addition to those relationships, I have been fortunate that from the day I graduated I have utilized my liberal arts education and degree.

I am not married nor have kids and am an avid runner/health enthusiast (which, by the way, started at Cornell). I work for a dual developmental disability agency and residential habilitation agency. It is a privately owned agency that provides services to children and adults with developmental diagnoses. Officially, my title is office manager, though it is not a great representation of what I do, which includes human resources and direct assistance to the administrator/owner. On nights and weekends, I “nanny.” I love kids and missed working with kids as a mental and emotional health specialist.

I graduated from Cornell with a bachelor’s degree in psychology; I was interested in psychology and medical dominant fields before attending Cornell. It was at Cornell that my specific interests in the human body from a kinesiology/fitness perspective were established, and a seed was planted. My courses emphasized the areas of psychology that are based in hard sciences versus social sciences like bio-psychology and health psychology. That seed continued to grow into what I have been most passionate about for the last 10 years, and right now I am training to be a certified wellness coach.