Education

CV

• Campus-Wide Champion For Change

  • California State University, Monterey Bay | 3.2022

• Certificate of Recognition

  • California state Assembly for leadership | 3.2016

• Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation Scholarship Recipient - 2000$

  • Undergraduate Research Opportunity Center | 10.2022

Biosafety/Biosecurity: Basic Introduction to Biosafety - CITI Program | November 2025 - November 2028

Certificate of Sustainability - CSUMB | April 2021

S-190 Wildland Fire Behavior - Bureau of Land Management | March 2019

S-130 Fire Fighting Training - Bureau of Land Management | March 2019

L-180 Human factors of the Fireline - Bureau of Land Management | March 2019

I-100 ICS System - Bureau of Land Management | March 2019

• We Are Ecosystem Engineers. Illustrations and Articles. Destiny Henderson-Hudgins. Substack. | 3.25.2026 - Present

• CSUMB Capstone Research Festival. Poster Presentation. Bacteria Isolated From Coyote Scat is More Resistant to Antibiotics, on Average, Than Pond and Soil Environments. Destiny Henderson-Hudgins, Mark McCoullough, Leonel Casino, Javier Lopez-Hernandez, Dr. Melanie Yu, Jenifer Kato M.S. Department of Biology and Chemistry, California State University, Monterey Bay. | 5.19.2022

• 9th Annual CSUMB Summer Research Symposium. Poster Presentation. Potential Soil Probiotics:  Exploring the Pathogen Inhibition Capacities of Soilborne Streptomyces from the Salinas Valley Against Pythium spp. Destiny Henderson-Hudgins, Morgan Raimondo, & Dr. Jose-Pablo Dundore Arias. Department of Biology and Chemistry, California State University, Monterey Bay. | 8.12.2022

• CSUMB Creative Scientists. Photography & Illustration publication (3 accepted submissions) - Student-led publication for creative scientific works | 3.14.2022

J. Gordon Edwards Entomology Museum - Volunteer Curator

San Jose, California | 10.15.2025 - Present

Museum Director: Dr. Frederick Larabee

• Digitizes insect specimens

• Organizes and prepares collection

• Identifies Insects referencing Peterson’s Insects Field Guides by Donald J. Borror & Richard E. White

CSUMB Sustainability Club - President/Founder

Monterey, CA | 9.2020 - 3.2022

• Introduced school sustainability plans and policy to the students and increased engagement in sustainable action.

• Through outreach and presentation student membership increase by an average of 300% over a period of 3 months

• Represented students at various faculty meetings, including the President’s Sustainability Committee

Chula Vista Living Coast Discovery Center - Chula Vista, CA

Avian Care Intern | 9.7.2018 - 12.6.2018

• Educated the public about birds, their care, and their conservation, through tours or presentations.

• Prepared the food for 30+ avian species each day including portioning meals, cleaning enclosures, butchering fish, and tracking eating habits

• Safely handled Raptors and shore birds for medication administration, transportation, and release

Paraeducator - Belmont, CA

Belmont Redwood Shores School District | 3.18.2026 - Present

• Collaborated with teachers, administrators, and parents to develop lesson plans 

• Monitored classroom materials and procedures

• Handled administrative tasks and documentation

Private Tutor - San Jose, CA

Club Z! Tutoring Services | 5.18.2023 - Present

• Engaged in educational support development by reviewing course material and selecting and designing curriculum to support students in an outside of the classroom

• Delivered educational content to students at all levels from 1st grade to High School

• Number of students: 24

• Subjected assisted in: Reading, Essay writing, General writing, Mathematics, Social Science, Statistics, General Science

Mobile Climate Science Lab - Volunteer Educator

Bay Area, California | 04.13.2024 - Present

• Guided people of all ages through interactive hands-on booths

• Educated students on the physical properties of climate change

• Presented at events with foot traffic that consisted of thousands of people including adults and children

• Events I’ve taught at: Mo'Magic Summer Kickoff at San Francisco Civic Center Plaza, Tri-Valley Innovation Fair at the Alameda County Fairgrounds, The Solano Avenue stroll, General events at the Chabot Science Center, Fremont Earth Day, North Bay Science Discovery Day, P.I.E.F.E.S.T, and NASA Fest at the NASA Ames Visitor Center

Coach/Attendance Coordinator - Seaside, CA

Elevo | 9.22.2023 - 5.1.2024

• Organized the attendance paperwork for staff and children

• Engaged with students in PE and Social, Emotional Learning Curriculum

• Lead groups of students in activities outside, demonstrating behavior management skills

• Interacted with parents during pick-up and drop off, answering questions and sharing important information

• Tutored and offered homework assistance to students

Chula Vista Living Coast - Educator/Docent

Chula Vista, CA | 1.2016 - 7.2016

• Interacted with an international visitor base on a constant basis, promoting excellent communication and customer service skills

• Guided guests through assigned exhibit, ensuring smooth, swift flow of traffic

• Monitored guest interactions with rays and ensured booth guest and animal safety in the petting area

Cal Fire research on Floral Resources and Pollinators in Fuel Break Sites

Lassen National Park, CA / Corvallis, OR

Oregon State University | 5.1.2024 - 7.30.2024

Primary Investigators: Megan Sampognaro and Dr. Jim Rivers

Project Goal: Field Study of Bee community, floral resource, and nesting resource responses to fuel break treatments

• Acted at assistant crew lead in charge of data quality assessment and site planning with Avenza Maps

• Assisted in designing schedules for the team

• Installed and collected samples using Butterfly Nets, Pan and Blue Vane Traps and Hobo Loggers

• Identified plants to genus and species throughout the Lassen Area 

  • Referenced Vern Oswald’s Selected Plants of Northern California and Adjacent Nevada 3rd edition by Lawrence P. Janeway

Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation

Mastatal, SJ, Costa Rica

Undergraduate Research Opportunity Center | 1.1.2023 - 1.19.2023

Primary Investigators: Dr. John "Buck" Banks & Dr. Robert Tournay

Project Goal: To capture and identify true spiders and beetles for a biodiversity analysis of species in Costa Rica at 3 different site types: organic farms, pastures, and jungle.

• Helped identify and label over 740 beetles and spiders and determined whether an invertebrate was a beetle, spider, or unimportant to the project

• Designed an organization system for labeling species in order to reduce confusion and error

• Acted as a point of reference to identify many different insect families that we came across

Streptomyces Isolate Management

Seaside, CA

Undergraduate Research Opportunity Center | 9.20.2022 -  11.8.2022

Primary Investigator: Dr. JP Dundore-Arias

Project Goal: To analyze and hopefully improve streptomyces yields from stock samples and to run pairwise inhibition tests of various streptomyces strains.

• Managed and improved the yields, from mine and others, past streptomyces strains

• Identified different microbial strains using various techniques, such as running pairwise inhibition tests and using biochemical assays

• Maintained and cared for equipment and prepped equipment for others to use including running an Autoclave

Analysis of Microbe abundance, Microbiology Honors Capstone

Seaside, CA

CSUMB | 1.13.2022 - 5.22.2022

Primary Faculty: Professor Jennifer Kato & Dr. Melanie Yu

Project Goal: To analyze data gathered by myself and other students in 3 different environments to determine differences in microbe abundance.

• Designed and executed an analysis of microbe data gathered by my group and the work of students from 3 different classes between 3 different environments

• Designed the promotional poster used tell others about our presentation

• Used statistical software to determine differences in microbe abundance

Course Based Microbiology Undergraduate Research

Seaside, CA

CSUMB | 8.14.2021 - 12.18.2021

Primary Faculty: Professor Jennifer Kato & Dr. Mealnie Yu

Project Goal: To gather and isolate soil microbes to identify them using various property tests, such as lacto-fermentation, gram positivity vs negativity, antibiotic resistance and more.

• Developed familiarity with different types of property tests used to identify bacteria, such as lacto-fermentation, gram staining, antibiotic susceptibility testing, and biochemical tests

• Effectively communicated and presented finding with team members and project leaders

• Collected, organized, and analyzed data for a class database on soil microbes

Undergraduate Research Fellow

Seaside, CA

CSUMB - UORC - Undergraduate Research Opportunity Center | 2.4.2022 - 8.22.2022 

Primary Investigator: Dr. JP Dundore-Arias

Project Goal: To determine the pathogen inhibition capabilities of Soil-Borne Streptomyces against lettuce-pathogenic microbes and itself. We also had the goal of isolating and identifying the Streptomyces species through PCR.

• Tested Inhibitory relationships between soil pathogens, such as Pythium Wilt, and common soil microbes with a focus on Streptomyces

• Organized and produced a collection of 67 successfully viable Streptomyces isolates by filtering lettuce soil samples and streaking the desired isolates on agar plates

• Presented findings in a clear and concise manner, through written reports and oral presentations including the 9th Annual CSUMB Summer Research Symposium

Variant Curation Project

Seaside, CA

CSUMB | 10.7.2021 - 12.13.2021

Primary Investigators: Dr. Simon Titen & Dr. Aparna Sreenivasan 

Project Goal: To investigate human genetic variants for potential of pathogenicity, activity, or none

• Identified human genetic variants using tools such as Provean, ClinVar, & PubVar

• Reported and Summarized evidence found across the internet related to protein variation

The Luxury Effect & Nature Gap: An analysis of the spatial relationship between socioeconomic status and arthropod(Insects & Arachnids) biodiversity within San Diego County between the years 2016 and 2017. Intro to ArcGIS - Department of Biology and Chemistry, California State University, Monterey Bay. Interactive Map - ArcGIS| 12.8.2022 https://docs.google.com/document/d/12GE71J-77i7on480dO70lndZKQTe1c89vezUSCromXw/edit?usp=sharing

• Sorted through and filtered over 140,000 insect and arachnid observations from I-Naturalist

  • Used Research-Grade observations only

  • Searched observations taken from January 1st of 2016 to December 31st of 2017

• Sourced and consolidated approximately 3130 insect and arachnid observations from I-Naturalist with socioeconomic census information from 41 cities within San Diego County

Insect Pinning Project from Collections. Agricultural Entomology - Department of Biology and Chemistry, California State University, Monterey Bay. Pinning Board | 10.11.2022

• Worked with a team to gather Insect Specimens throughout the semester and displayed them on a pinning board 

• Voted in the class as the best looking presentation

• Pinned 13 different insect families

• Identified the species collected through reference books (P.J.Gullan & P.S. Cranston and J.L. Castner)