Anna Riley-Shepard was born in Johnson, Vermont and traveled widely with her linguist mother and poet father as a child, cultivating a deep interest in people. She spent third grade in Paris and moved with her family to New York City at fourteen. She has danced all her life but intensified her training at the School at Steps on Broadway during these years. At Harvard, she has explored her penchant for research and people, choosing to study cognitive neuroscience. This past year she took a leave of absence from Harvard to apprentice with a contemporary dance company in Catania, Italy, where she has developed her identity as a professional dancer, as well as learned Italian. Before returning to school in the fall, she looks forward to applying the research skills she has learned at Harvard and the life skills she has learned abroad to her internship with the Global Health Corps.