Always having the desire to pursue higher education Heather knew her Bachelors at the University of Kansas was just the beginning. She received her Bachelor of Arts in Global and International Studies and Co-major in European Studies. She has spent time studying both Spanish and French. Her area of focus as an undergrad was Latin America and the Caribbean with specialization in culture, ethnicity and belief systems. Heather was drawn to the human aspect of international relations. Instead of becoming enthralled in the politics she began to wonder about the people. Combining this interest with a long standing passion for literature and the humanities she took anthropology, sociology, and religious studies classes, courses on human rights literature, and indigenous literature to understand the individual living in this geopolitical world. These courses established an academic interest in identity and its formation. She spent a semester abroad in Florence, Italy and Paris, France studying art and architecture as well as European history and Western civilizations. When abroad she was able to embrace her love of travel and passion for cuisine, especially sea food, while visiting countries such as Spain, Netherlands, and Belgium as well as exploring Italy and France. This time abroad confirmed her desire to explore the human experience and its expression. Eager to experience even more diversity when she came home, she opened up her cultural explorations to Eastern Europe and Asia, a path she hopes to further explore during her Masters at UCSB.

As her undergraduate career came to a close she culminated her studies with research for the State Department on religiosity and gender equality to understand the impact of religiosity vs religion on gender equality. Additionally, her capstone research focused on language and power, in terms of identity and resistance to Russian nationalism, in the Baltic States. This is the kind of research she hopes to continue at UCSB. She is interested in understanding the connections between language, rhetoric, religion and identity. How do nations force these ideologies onto groups of people? How do these people respond, resist or embrace? And what role does literature play (for the nation and individual) in establishing these ideologies and ultimately, identities? Finally, she hopes to explore the power of religion in establishing identity in the modern world and how this can end up leading to conflict.