By Ian Wesselhoff

U ntil he left for college, Dakota Warren had lived in Milledgeville his whole life. His mom, Dr. Talecia Warren, is a professor at Georgia College & State University, and Dakota himself attended Georgia College Early College from eighth grade through high school. 

When it came time to choose a college, he wanted to spread his wings beyond what he was used to, and he decided to move to Atlanta. 

Now a chemistry major at Georgia College, he says he accomplished more in his one year at GCSU than he did in three years at his other school. 

“It’s actually crazy. I had no idea I would do this much,” Warren said. “Just by me being at Georgia College, I’ve gotten a lot of opportunities for different things, like my internship, doing research and having my own initiative – I feel like that’s been so much more than I could do at my previous school.” 

Warren is spending his summer as an intern at the Real Time Crime Center, a state-of-the-art facility where the Baldwin County Sheriff’s Office staff aggregates information from sources like social media, facial recognition software, state and federal databases, jail logs and high-tech Flock cameras installed across Baldwin County to monitor traffic. 

“We’re just seeing what trends have happened in the past, what violent acts have happened, so we can try to prevent that on the day, or at least be able to act and respond faster,” Warren said. 

Warren discovered the internship after telling the Career Center about his interest in forensics. He says he hopes to join the Georgia Bureau of Investigation after graduating. 

Research is different here 

GCSU requires all its chemistry students to participate in a research group – “which is usually something they don’t do until graduate, master’s level, or even doctorate level, if they want to go for that,” Warren said. “So the fact that we’re doing it now is insane.” 

Alongside all four other members of his research group, Warren was accepted into the highly competitive International Sol-Gel Conference in Lisbon, Portugal, where he will present his research among scientists with Ph.D.s, graduate students and other sol-gel scientists from across the globe from August 31 to September 4. 

Dr. Catrena Lisse, the research group’s faculty mentor, knew Warren back when he was a high schooler at Early College through a dual-enrollment class he took. 

“I tried to convince him to stay here and come to college here, especially once he told me his area of interest: forensic chemistry,” Lisse said. “When he sent me the email asking about coming back, I was elated. Over the moon.” 

Even when he was off in Atlanta, they still kept in touch. Warren would see Lisse’s social media posts about her students’ accomplishments and research, and he realized he was missing out. 

“He’s like, ‘I should be doing that, but I’m not. I haven’t been able to get into research yet, and I’m about to start my second year there, and I haven’t been able to use any of the chemical instruments there,’” Lisse said. “So when he came back here, he still had that same enthusiasm that I knew when he was younger at Early College and he jumped straight in, and he has been going full-force ever since.” 

Now a senior, Warren takes on a leadership role for the younger students – including his position as a mentor for the Young Scientists Academy, a six-week summer program that allows high school students of any grade to conduct university-level laboratory research at GCSU. 

“Usually, stuff like that you don’t really participate in until the graduate level, so the fact that they’re doing this not even as undergraduates but in high school – it’s super phenomenal, in my opinion,” Warren said. “I really wish I participated in this when I was at Early College, because I didn’t know this was a thing … We’re trying to give them a step up above everybody else when they’re coming into college.” 

With all the hands-on opportunities he has found since his return, Warren says he understands what truly makes it different here. 

“Coming back here was definitely one of the best things that happened to me. I’m very glad I made that decision,” Warren said. 

Header Images: Dakota Warren with other Sheriff's Office staff members at Baldwin County's Real Time Crime Center. (Photos: Gil Pound)