Alexandra Poret is proving that passion and purpose can thrive side by side.

As a U.S. Figure Skating collegiate ambassador, she proudly represents the next generation of collegiate skaters, balancing leadership with her roles in both the Harvard Figure Skating Club and the MIT Figure Skating Club, in which she organizes their annual intercollegiate competition. Off the ice, Poret brings the same dedication to academic pursuits, conducting biophysics research at Harvard University.

Her journey is a testament to what's possible when commitment meets passion.

The Sparta, New Jersey, native has called Cambridge, Massachusetts, home for the past eight years.

"During my undergrad, I worked primarily with Tami Lieberman in MIT's Institute for Medical Engineering and Science, studying bacterial evolution in various forms. My joke is that I was studying pathogen evolution before COVID made it cool," Poret said.

Poret loved working on microbial evolution throughout undergrad, especially the quantitative approaches to biology where mathematical modeling and large-scale datasets come together to reveal patterns in biological behavior.

"That interest led me to Harvard's biophysics PhD program, where I now work with Michael Desai on the evolution of antibodies," Poret said.

Yet, unlike many collegiate skaters, Poret didn't learn to skate until her college years.

"During my freshman fall, I tagged along with a dormmate to the MIT Figure Skating Club's Saturday morning Learn to Skate classes. I figured it was a good excuse to get out of bed, and I need friends," Poret said. "Ironically, my friend graduated and moved on, but skating stuck."

When Poret started her PhD at Harvard, she suddenly found more flexibility in her schedule and used it to become more involved with both MIT's and Harvard's Figure Skating Clubs.

"MIT's policy allowing alumni to stay active in club sports has been invaluable," Poret said. "Not only for skating but for community and mentorship."

At MIT, she's served in a variety of leadership roles, including planning winter and spring shows and the club's intercollegiate competition in 2025 and 2026.

She's also taken on leadership within Harvard's Club, where she now serves as vice president, and she is a U.S. Figure Skating collegiate ambassador for the 2025-26 season.

"The role is a blend of outward-facing and behind-the-scenes work," Poret said. "Supporting outreach and social media efforts but also serving as one of the few students who regularly interfaces with U.S. Figure Skating to give direct feedback.

"I care deeply about improving accessibility for adult collegiate skaters, those of us who didn't grow up in the sport, so I've worked with U.S. Figure Skating to propose eligibility and cost reforms to improve the intercollegiate experience as well as to help create content highlighting adult learning skaters."

And skating has helped her develop many skills she's actually applied to her research.

"When I work, I often find I'm very time blind," Poret said. "I'll get intensely absorbed in a task, then hammer it to the point of nonproductivity. Skating has helped me learn diligence and time management. Repeating the same skill 100 times over in a row won't necessarily lead to improvement if your technique is wrong to begin with. I'm also forced to better manage my time to make sure I can comfortably schedule time to skate."

Skating has also taught her valuable organizational and management skills, especially in coordinating the MIT intercollegiate competition.

"Research is a funny field in that it often feels like there are no real deadlines," Poret said. "Of course, there are, but unlike homework assignments with problems you know are solvable, research problems are open-ended, and it can be hard to predict how long it will take to unravel something no one has solved before.

 "Managing skating logistics, on the other hand, comes with very real deadlines that you can't push back because the problem is hard. It's a great reminder that sometimes good enough has to be well, good enough."

She hopes to pursue a long-term career in research, though she is still unsure whether it will be in academia or private industry.

"I'd love to continue working in evolutionary immunology," Poret said. "The immune system's immense cellular diversity leaves countless open questions how constrained B cell evolution really is,  why we don't chronically trigger autoimmune responses, and what mechanisms underlie confusing phenomena like post-viral symptoms."

Her future skating goals include landing an Axel.

"I was working on preparatory exercises for the jump this summer, but unfortunately shattered one of my toes in early fall, so I've been away from skating a bit," Poret said. "I did not break it skating, as everyone likes to ask. Turns out baking an apple crumble is dangerous. Once I'm back on ice, I'm looking forward to improving my skating skills. Step sequences are my favorite part of any competition program, and I would love to express the movements I envision in my head."

And if she could pick one word to describe herself, it would be resilient.

"No matter how many times my hypothesis fails or I smash into the ice, I'm great at getting up, bruised knees and all," Poret said.