In this week’s “Best Of” episode, we present two stories of people having to navigate a new world.

Part 1: Sean Bearden has never been interested in education, but when he's incarcerated at the age of 19, he finds a passion for physics.

Part 2: When Victoria Manning decides to get a cochlear implant, she fears losing her identity as a deaf person.

Sean Bearden is a Ph. D. candidate in Physics at UC San Diego, researching the application and development of memcomputing systems, a novel computing paradigm. Identifying as a nontraditional student, Sean went from dropping out of high school to receiving the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship and Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship. To alleviate the stress that is inevitably coupled with graduate research, he enjoys training Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu at the P5 Academy in San Diego. Visit seanbearden.com to learn more.

Deaf from the age of four Victoria was raised in a family who instilled a high value on educational achievement and a strong sense of social justice. Victoria gained a bachelor degree in New Zealand (without the support of sign language interpreters) followed by a Masters degree in the United States before returning to New Zealand in the late 1990’s. Victoria’s deaf identity began in her close relationship with her older deaf brother, both raised orally, and later flourished in the New Zealand Deaf community and the culture-affirming experience of attending a Deaf university (Gallaudet) in the United States. Victoria’s first career was in psychology but she soon gravitated to human rights/disability rights work and moved into a series of strategic and policy roles across central government and NGOs. Victoria’s life highlights include being the key government advisor on the development of the New Zealand Sign Language Act 2006; representing New Zealand disabled people's voices at the United Nations in Geneva in 2014; and receiving a Queen’s Service Award for her services to the deaf and disabled communities in 2015. Most significantly, she appreciates the privileges and joys that come with being a wife and mother of two.

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