Meet Claudia Kodsuntie ’23,  a Business Administration major with an emphasis in Management and a minor in Environmental Science! Claudia’s plan to come to Chapman and study at the Argyros School was to get a business degree to help her start a small business selling her pottery. A business degree is applicable to many jobs, therefore, she thought it would be a good choice even if her future plans changed.

Impactful Experiences

Pottery and ceramics are of immense interest to Claudia. She has loved her time in the ceramics studio at Chapman as it is the place she has made some of her closest friends, spent the most amount of time, and felt the most at home on campus. She says that one semester in ceramics, they made pizza in one of the kilns. “All of the students brought an ingredient, Dave brought homemade pizza dough, and we all hung out like a family making dinner together and talking about our art. It was a really special day I will never forget!”

Claudia has also been involved in two research projects on campus, one working on David Kiddie’s Martian ceramics project and the other processing blood samples from birds. Claudia worked with The Loon Project under Dr. Walter Piper for a summer studying birds in Wisconsin (where she will be working again Summer of 2023), took those blood samples, and worked as a research intern under Dr. Marco Bisoffi where she isolated the DNA from them before running PCR to complete a telomere length analysis.

Other than spending time in the ceramics studio, Claudia really loves the Keck Center for Science and Engineering and says that “being around other STEM students makes me feel really empowered and productive.”

Favorite Classes

You might guess that Claudia’s favorite class is ceramics, but she told us that it is actually a tie between ornithology and ceramics! “I loved ornithology because I feel like I learned the most in that class, it also made me realize how much I love studying birds which led to me applying to graduate school to study ecology with a focus on birds,” said Kodsuntie. She loves to go birding at Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve in Huntington Beach. She says that it is one of the most beautiful places and the biodiversity there is unmatched.

About ceramics, she said it was a favorite class of hers “because of the work, the safety of the studio, the people, and the culture. I have learned so much from that class both about ceramics and about myself.”

Post-Grad Plans

Over the summer after graduation, Claudia will be working with The Loon Project again as a field research intern. “When I come home from Wisconsin I will be working at an environmental consulting company part-time, selling my ceramics part-time, and applying to graduate schools for a Masters in ecology.” Is there anything you want to discuss that has yet to be touched upon?

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Words from Claudia: “Find the spaces and people that make you feel like you, don’t force yourself to fit in, some place and some people will accept you just the way you are.”

Congratulations, Claudia! We are very excited for you and can’t wait to see all the amazing things you accomplish!