Cherish completed coursework, general practice internship, and clinical practicum while in the program at Indiana State University Department of Social Work. She took specialized classes in marriage and family therapy and in human trafficking. Her final practice evaluation project “Social Worker Comfort with Taboo Conversations: Measuring the ‘Ick Factor’ with Sex and Relationships among Baccelaureate Social Work Students” examined professional comfort when working with clients with various concerns related to sex education, sexual behavior, and relationships.

She completed her general internship and clinical practicum with Cummins Behavioral Health in Greencastle, Indiana. During her internship and practicum, she helped facilitate the Lasting Recovery group for adults with substance use disorder, helped facilitate the adolescent intensive outpatient treatment (IOT) virtual group for teens with substance use issues, worked at the Green Willows group home for persons with serious mental illness, and she saw individual clients for clinical assessment and intervention.

Cherish completed coursework and passed qualifying and language exams toward a doctorate in history. Her first field of focus was modern European history, particularly the British empire in South Asia after 1850. Her second field of focus was world history, with a focus on connections between oceans and through religion. She presented original research “A Doctor without Borders: Alice Sorabji, Woman Medical Missionary in the Northwest Frontier Province” at conferences. Her dissertation project examined the differences between human rights practice in British India compared to Europe with regard to child care and oversight by the newly-formed League of Nations.

Cherish studied modern European history for this degree in preparation for the doctorate in the same field. Her project “Battling that Hideous Strength: C.S. Lewis on Morality, State, and Civil Society in Britain during the Second World War” highlighted Lewis’ role as a public intellectual who used Christian apologetics to galvanize unity between Western nations by examining his nonfiction and adult fiction from the time period.

Cherish completed her bachelor degree with a focus on European history and modern British empire. She presented two of her projects at national conferences and won two essay contests with her original research.