USU Science Valedictorian Sterling Sturgill Pursues Life of Service, Future Medical Career

Utah State University scholar Sterling Sturgill will never forget his first visit, at age 11, to the Philippines.

“I’d seen poverty-stricken areas in photos, but seeing it face-to-face was a life-changing experience,” says Sturgill, who grew up in Kimberly, Idaho. “It was eye-opening to learn people showered themselves from a small bucket, and their only bathroom was a hole they’d dug in the ground.”

Sturgill, a human biology major with a business minor, has carried this memory into his undergraduate career and doesn’t take the opportunities he’s been given for granted. Named valedictorian for the College of Science, he will graduate this spring with a bachelor’s degree and deliver the graduation address at the May 2 College of Science Convocation during USU commencement ceremonies.

Sturgill’s father, a certified financial planner, organized that pivotal family trip to the southeast Asian country as a humanitarian mission. It was one of a number of trips the family undertook to the Philippines to help with home construction, pop-up dental clinics and job training activities.

“During our first trip, we rebuilt homes destroyed by Typhoon Yolanda,” Sturgill says. “But a vivid memory is holding the hands of terrified people with broken and rotted teeth as they awaited their first visit with a dentist.”

Back home in Idaho, Sturgill pored over a manual for a portable X-ray machine used for the clinics, memorized the tooth numbering system and learned phrases in Tagalog to help him communicate with Filipinos on subsequent trips.

“After seeing the impact removing a few rotten teeth had on people, I knew I wanted to make that kind of meaningful service an integral part of my entire life,” he says.

Serving others wasn’t something new to Sturgill. During each winter, the Magic Valley youngster knew that thick white carpet on the driveway was a signal to don his puffer coat and snow boots, grab a shovel and start clearing. Once done, Sturgill and his four siblings piled in the family car and were dispatched to shovel snow for the town’s elderly and disabled residents.

“That same mentality followed us in our family garden, at our church and at school,” he says. “Our parents instilled a solid work ethic and commitment to service.”

At age 14, Sturgill, old enough to begin training as a Boy Scout river guide, seized the opportunity to indulge his passion for Idaho whitewater.

“As soon as I was allowed, I began working as a river guide, leading scouts on trips along the middle fork of the Salmon River,” he says. “Those summer jobs, which I continued throughout high school and into college, never felt like work.”

Mentoring first-time paddlers on weeklong river trips was also an opportunity to build teaching and leadership skills.

Sturgill says loss of Wi-Fi access and the unfamiliar roar of whitewater caught many of the fledgling campers off guard. And rightly so.

“When boats flipped in the large waves, I led paddlers to perform quick maneuvers, as I shouted instructions to those overboard while throwing a safety rope,” he says. “As I pulled them in the boat and checked for injuries, they learned they were in safe hands.”

Sharing his past river adventures with the campers, Sturgill encouraged them to share their life stories.

“You could see their confidence growing as the week progressed,” he says. “They paddled with enthusiasm and asked to sit in the boat’s bow to face the rolling waves, rather than hiding behind leaders and peers. I saw their faces change.”

When considering his college destination, Sturgill, who graduated from Kimberly High School in 2019, chose not to leave the mountains.

He reviewed multiple schools in Utah and throughout the Pacific Northwest and says what stood out about Utah State, in contrast to other colleges, was no one who had attended had anything negative to say about it.

“People who went to Utah State loved it,” Sturgill says. “When I toured the campus, it felt like a great fit, with a strong — but not cutthroat-competitive — science program. And when I learned I could go to the Aggie Rec Center and climb for free, it was the cherry on top.”

At Utah State, Sturgill pursued research with faculty mentor Ryan Jackson, the R. Gaurth Hansen Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, who will serve as the valedictorian’s escort during commencement.

“Dr. Jackson showed me what basic science research can make possible,” he says. “I worked on a CRISPR-associated protein complex designed to edit mammalian cells to be used in treatment of genetic diseases. He showed me how to examine current obstacles with gene editing systems and how to overcome them.”

Together, the undergrad and professor developed a design for a novel dual-protein complex.

“Working with Dr. Jackson allowed me to actively apply the concepts I had been learning in class,” Sturgill says. “The experience was instructive and I will never forget it.”

Along with university studies, Sturgill completed a Latter-day Saint mission to Poland, during which he worked with refugees fleeing war-torn Ukraine. The plight of a mother — who left her home with her son who uses a wheelchair, her mother and one bag, especially touched him.

“I felt very underqualified as I listened in awe of her sacrifice and courage,” he says. “She had no place for her family to live, had few resources, and was still paying rent on the family’s apartment back in Ukraine near the war’s front lines.”

As he prayed with her, Sturgill vowed to find help. Between writing essays for his medical school application, he contacted every aid organization he could think of, along with Polish real estate agents and landlords.

“With the help of countless selfless people, I organized regular grocery deliveries and collected donations for furniture and rent,” he says. “A landlord agreed to a lowered rent arrangement while the family got settled. The family is now happily adjusting to their new life in Poland.”

Sturgill will enter the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine in Oklahoma City this fall. He plans to specialize in oncology.

Two of his grandparents succumbed to cancer, he says, and a close family friend received a devastating stage-4 colon cancer diagnosis at age 38.

“He learned this just as I was starting my undergrad degree and considering medical school,” Sturgill said. “He often joked with me that one day I would become his doctor. Thoughts of helping him and others drove my decisions.”

Sturgill looks forward to new challenges but says he’ll miss Logan. Among his favorite extracurricular activities during his USU years was volunteering with the English as a Second Language program at Ellis Elementary School.

“I eagerly awaited those Tuesday and Thursday afternoons when I tutored young readers and congratulated them when they had moved up a letter or color in their reading progress,” says Sturgill, who filled his car with fellow Aggies he recruited to help with the program. “I love seeing those kids around the community and I rejoice in their successes.”