{"id":364,"date":"2025-12-11T07:55:54","date_gmt":"2025-12-11T12:55:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/?p=364"},"modified":"2025-12-11T07:55:54","modified_gmt":"2025-12-11T12:55:54","slug":"occupational-scientist-combines-research-and-service","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/2025\/12\/11\/occupational-scientist-combines-research-and-service\/","title":{"rendered":"Occupational scientist combines research and service"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Kierra Peak\u2019s introduction to UNC-Chapel Hill was attending Project Uplift<\/a> as a rising high school senior.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I want to go here,\u201d she thought after her first time on campus.<\/p>\n

A year later, she made Carolina home and enjoyed her undergraduate experience, majoring in anthropology. After receiving a master\u2019s degree from Lenoir-Rhyne University, Peak returned to Chapel Hill to pursue a doctorate in occupational science<\/a> at the UNC School of Medicine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The native of Fayetteville, North Carolina, will become a double Tar Heel when she receives her doctoral degree this month.<\/p>\n

The root of occupational science, Peak \u201914, \u201925 (PhD) said, is \u201ccaring about how people can engage in their lives to the fullest.\u201d As a doctoral student, she continued to explore that mission through her research, teaching and service.<\/p>\n

One of The Graduate School\u2019s Royster Fellows<\/a>, she completed a dissertation on how youth activism shapes the identities of young people and impacts their well-being, sometimes negatively. Peak sought to answer the question \u201cHow can we better serve students who are doing this work?\u201d<\/p>\n

Learn more about Kierra’s story.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kierra Peak\u2019s introduction to UNC-Chapel Hill was attending Project Uplift as a rising high school senior. \u201cI think I want to go here,\u201d she thought after her first time on campus. A year later, she made Carolina home and enjoyed her undergraduate experience, majoring in anthropology. After receiving a master\u2019s degree from Lenoir-Rhyne University, Peak … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":112547,"featured_media":365,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"layout":"","cellInformation":"","apiCallInformation":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni-stories","odd"],"acf":[],"featured_image":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1470\/2025\/12\/KierraPeak_HERO.avif","featured_image_medium":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1470\/2025\/12\/KierraPeak_HERO-300x169.avif","featured_image_medium_large":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1470\/2025\/12\/KierraPeak_HERO-768x432.avif","featured_image_large":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1470\/2025\/12\/KierraPeak_HERO-1024x576.avif","featured_image_thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1470\/2025\/12\/KierraPeak_HERO-150x150.avif","featured_image_alt":"","category_details":[{"name":"Alumni Stories","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/category\/alumni-stories\/"}],"tag_details":[],"_links_to":[],"_links_to_target":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/112547"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=364"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":366,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364\/revisions\/366"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}