Passion Projects

In fall 2023, biotech entrepreneur John Lee Compton made a $3.2 million gift to establish The Compton Lab for Discovery and Innovation at the University of Arizona’s W.A. Franke Honors College. This gift supports the Compton Fund for Exploration and Compton Chair for Creative Intelligence and Innovation, held by Jacqueline Melvold, who oversees the Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation dual degree program. The fund for exploration offers mini grants to students pursuing their passions both within and outside their primary majors.

Brandon Friend, a physics and mathematics student, used his mini grant to advance his research in quantum computing and nuclear physics, fields he believes “have the potential to revolutionize all of the science we do today.”

Daryl Ijaola, a biomedical engineering student with plans to attend medical school, used his mini grant to start weekly poetry workshops at the University of Arizona’s Main Library. While studying for the MCAT, Ijaola simultaneously began writing a book.

Taylor Raney, a physiology and medical sciences student, also explored writing — a practice she’d taken up in her first semester poetry class but struggled to maintain due to her busy schedule.

Her mini grant not only allowed her to host an exhibition that sparked crucial discussions about mental health but also led to Raney teaching writing workshops at middle schools in Tucson. “I wanted to give them the gift that I had gotten from my class,” she says: “expressing myself in a new way.”