Name: Sarah Scheerer

College: College of Engineering

Hometown: Lynchburg, VA

Major: Biomedical Engineering

Plans after graduation: Staying at Virginia Tech to complete a master’s degree in biodesign from the School of Biomedical Engineering Science (SBES).

Timing is everything

Raised by two former Hokies, both forestry majors, the 2024 Biomedical Engineering and Mechanics (BEAM) Outstanding Senior, Sarah Scheerer, was destined to find her way to Blacksburg; however, it was during high school and one of her dual enrollment courses at Central Virginia Community College, that her interest in biomedical engineering was born.

Scheerer shared, “I had a professor who taught biology like it was a mechanical system. That’s actually why I decided to do biomedical engineering. He always said, ‘If I could go back to school, I'd be an engineer.’ I was like, ‘Oh, that's interesting. I hadn't thought about the biological processes as a series of steps. This is so cool. I want to do THAT!'”

A short time later, Scheerer attended an open house at Virginia Tech and learned about the new biomedical engineering major. She also attended a camp on the Blacksburg campus the summer before her senior year in high school, where she met Leah Thomas '22, who shared her experience in the Biomedical Engineering and Mechanics department. After talking with Thomas, her mind was made up.

Scheerer applied and interviewed, but was a little nervous she wouldn’t be accepted. “I had to complete the application and interview to get in," she said. "I thought, ‘This is it. I'm going to have to pick a different major.’ I didn't know if I interviewed well enough and thought, 'Ok, well, I'll pick something different," but then going through the other options, I was like, ‘Man, I really hope I get in.'”

Blank walls to colorful memories

The Lynchburg native arrived on campus in the Fall of 2020 when COVID was in full swing.

"Being on campus was a little weird," Scheerer said. "I didn't want to take a gap year - it wasn't something I was really interested in doing. I wanted to keep the education rolling and just get my degree.”

She continued, “My first night on campus - my roommate hadn't moved in yet - I was putting pictures up on my very blank, white wall because I needed it to not be so empty. I was thinking I might just go home, but the next day, my roommate moved in, and it got so much better.”

Those first few months were a bit of an adjustment, as freshman year often can be, but as time passed Scheerer made friends and experienced more of the campus and what Blacksburg had to offer.

“I am very fortunate to have an amazing group of friends and family in my support system. My college experience has been strongly shaped by the friends I have made since coming to Virginia Tech. We've gotten to do so many fun adventures and other things together - football games, lots of hikes, festivals, trivia, bingo, snowball fights, intramural sports, weekend trips, spring break trips, and studying for hours and hours and hours. They are a big part of what makes Blacksburg feel like home for me,” Scheerer reminisced.

Passion for Problem-Solving

During her time at Virginia Tech, she has been a teaching assistant, biodesign program intern, and worked shadowing in a prosthetics and orthotics clinical setting.

She has also held several leadership and community engagement roles:

In addition, Scheerer has done a tremendous amount of design work, from serving as team lead for her senior design project to helping co-design a device as part of the Bioinstrumentation Laboratory, as well as work on various group projects as part of the Biomedical Engineering Cellular Lab and Design. 

But, it has been her time spent working with patients directly to solve problems in real-time where she has found her passion. “Being able to help improve people's quality of life, getting to interact with patients, and seeing the end result of things is what I get really excited about,” Scheerer explained.

One such opportunity has been the IV Pole project for her senior design class inspired by her time in the biodesign internship the summer before her senior year. She described the moment she recognized a problem that needed solving.

“We split our time between surgery immersions and nursing immersions," Scheerer said. "I love talking to surgeons and nurses. It's so much fun and I like trying to figure out how to make their lives better. That's my favorite part because I really like solving problems. There are so many things that haven't been fixed in health care. My senior design project team, Devin Donnelly, Douglas Argueta, Megan Gulian, and Utsav Shah, redesignied an IV pole – a need I identified during my internship while I was shadowing a nurse."

"It’s really cool to think, for our senior design project, we're trying to empower nurses or trying to take a step to make nurses lives' easier. I think a lot of times nurses get overlooked. I'm excited our project is doing something for this group of professionals that are critical to patient well-being.”

Student with long brown hair, dressed in a dark suit, stands with an IV Pole
Sarah Scheerer stands with the final design of the IV Pole BME Senior Design Project. Photo by Michelle Darby for Virginia Tech.

Designing a future

What happens next? Scheerer has been on the accelerated master’s path with plans to join the Carilion Clinic Biodesign Program at Virginia Tech within BEAM’s SBES program. Her ultimate goal is a research and development job.

"I would be the link between communicating engineering ideas with health care professionals. Then, I'd work on the engineering side and present to it to them," Scheerer said.

Finding her voice and her time spent in BEAM, has solidified her passion for problem solving and designing her future path.

“I've definitely grown to be confident in myself and my ideas," Scheerer shared. "For a while, if I had an idea, I wouldn't speak up. But I've realized the things I've come up with or think or say are valuable. I truly feel as though I have found my place at Virginia Tech, the College of Engineering, and within BEAM. I will value the connections I have made with my peers, faculty, and staff for the rest of my life. I am proud of the impact I have been able to make within this broader community while working alongside students who care about making a positive difference in the world.”

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