Gabriella DeRaedt ’22

Gabriella DeRaedt2 Gabriella DeRaedt works for the New York City Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, the largest public DNA crime laboratory in the world. She credits the partnership between Bowling Green State University and the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation for preparing her well for this competitive opportunity while majoring in forensic science.

DeRaedt claims that she “was never very good at science” and so chose her major for its practical application, as “it was actually day-to-day helping people, solving cases, and finding the truth.”

She believes that having professors with careers in the field was instrumental to her success. Her education included not only direct skills, but exposure to the emotional work she would find in forensic science careers.

“You’re dealing with a lot of tragic things that have happened, so to have preparation for that, some candor and truth from professors about what I might actually experience made me feel more prepared for the case work that I’m seeing,” she said.

DeRaedt hopes to stay in New York for the foreseeable future and believes her BGSU education set her up for success. But before you ask, her job is nothing like CSI.