|
When Janice began college at USM she thought she might want to study something in between medical school and nursing, like maybe becoming a Physician’s Assistant, but she didn’t know what to think. During her first year, she visited career services to see what information they offered and she tried to meet with her faculty advisor but he seemed hard to get hold of. Janice went to a Chemistry Club meeting because she saw a sign that said, "Free Pizza". A couple of the chemistry professors were at the lunch and they seemed helpful so Janice emailed one to ask if she could meet with him and talk about careers. Janice didn’t have him for any classes yet but he said that was fine, no problem. When they met, he talked about career ideas, not just for medical school, but all the possible jobs in health. One example he used was an eye doctor, because he just had a former student graduate from optometry school, which seemed kind of random to Janice but kind of interesting. He talked about the importance of getting experience in service to others in order to prepare for a job in a health field because schools and employers don’t just want scientists, they want students who care about serving others. As an example, he suggested Janice could volunteer at a nursing home. Janice’s grandmother lived in a nursing home and so Janice decided to spend more time there and she talked to the nurses about volunteering. They were happy with the idea. Janice began helping in a variety of ways. One thing she enjoyed was helping to read letters and books out loud because many residents had weak eyesight and needed help. That quickly became Janice’s expertise. Working at the nursing home, she met Janet who was a nurse’s aide. Janet worked full time but also took some art classes at USM and MECA because she loved to paint. Janice described why she was volunteering at the nursing home and suggested Janet could maybe do something similar with her art. Over the next couple of years, they worked together to bring reading and art to the residents whose vision was weakening. Along the way, Janice learned a lot about eye health and as she was finishing at USM she decided to apply to optometry school. She got great recommendations from one of her science professors (who had become her academic advisor) as well as a really great recomendation from a doctor at the nursing home (true story!). Meanwhile, Janet had met with many people through her effort to bring art into nursing homes. Through the network of people she met, Janet got a part time job in an art gallery in Portland and started to get her work into exhibits, which was a dream come true. Meanwhile, she was able to continue taking classes one or two at a time toward finishing her college degree. (Janice and Janet aren’t their real names.) The goal of our ARS110 class is to help students build connections and skills in order to create a personal pathway that will become their own unique, college education. A very important part of Janice's and Janet's college education took place outside of the classroom.
We welcome links to these pages. If you create a link, please contact us so we can make a personal link too. Thanks!
If you have problems with this page, please contact: David Champlin.
|
