“Academically, I found my drive to learn renewed,” Alisa Braun says of the time following her skiing accident. “During my recovery, I went to my doctor appointments curious. I’d never had such a strong desire to understand and to try to comprehend what was happening in my brain.”
Incoming first-year student Alisa Braun seemingly had high school on lock as a member of the National Honor Society, student council and Bozeman High marching band, but after a skiing accident nearly took it all away, she was left with a new outlook on life.
Braun was cross-country skiing in her hometown of Bozeman, Mont., when she collided with another skier and hit her head on the ice. The accident resulted in a severe concussion and ultimately cost Braun six weeks of her junior year, as she was unable to participate in school or the extracurricular activities she loved.
“My ski accident junior year left me with a lot of questions about who I really was,” Braun says. “It was scary — I lived at such a fast pace that I felt that somewhere outside of the clubs, AP classes and sports teams, I lost who I really was.”
While the accident may have been demoralizing to some, it was anything but that for Braun. It was during her six weeks in bed that she gained new interests and reinvigorated her thirst for knowledge. In part because of the accident, Braun has chosen to study cognitive neuroscience and psychology at the University of Denver.
“Academically, I found my drive to learn renewed,” she says. “During my recovery, I went to my doctor appointments curious. I’d never had such a strong desire to understand and to try to comprehend what was happening in my brain.”
Braun was able to recover from the accident and finish high school as an exemplary student with a true lust for life. College testing service ACT awarded her its ACT College and Career Readiness Award for her outstanding academic standing, as well as her ability to overcome adversity. She spent summer 2014 kayaking in Norway and backpacking in Sweden.
“What I realized after the accident was what I hadn’t been doing for myself. I hadn’t explored anywhere new or taken risks that stretched me physically or mentally,” Braun says. “I had become so bogged down in every high school student’s desire to find who they are that I was doing just the opposite; I was letting what I did become who I was. From that point on, I have spent most of my time living open to experiences that I know will help define me in a positive way.”