From a young age, Nicole Fleege, MD’s family told her she could be anything she wanted to be. She oscillated between dreams of being a doctor, a lawyer, or a veterinarian. However, when it came to deciding whether she wanted a career in medicine, she was hesitant. “I took a detour from medicine because my dad got cancer when I was a junior in high school and then passed away from lung cancer when I was a senior,” she explains. “So my first few years in college, I just wasn’t sure I wanted to do medicine.”

Melissa Palma (15MD) is many things these days—a physician, an educator, an advocate. But when it all began, she was an Iowan. “I like to tell people I spent K through 20th grade in Iowa,” she says.