(lively music) - I'm Starla Sampaco in the Crosscut KCTS9 newsroom.
(bright music) Rosa Hunter is a Lab Manager at the Salish Sea Research Center and she's inspiring indigenous students to pursue science and know that it's never too late.
Hunter dropped out of high school in the 10th grade and worked every job, from digging ditches to housekeeping, before heading to college at age 32.
It was there that she found her love for ancient organisms like tardigrades.
Lessons learned from clamming with her grandmother as a child now inform her work identifying toxic shellfish in the ocean.
The world of science is full of facts and figures, but behind the study are the people.
In the end, it becomes a question not of how they do science, but why.
Studying everything from wildlife to video games, learn more about Washington's most fascinating scientists in season two of Human Elements.
I'm Starla Sampaco.
Find more episodes of Human Elements on Crosscut.com.
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