Year 1
It's been a year since I set off on my undergraduate journey and the time has truly flown. I had many expectations when I came to the University of Cincinnati, but at the same time I also had very little idea as far as what to expect. Having gone through public schooling my whole life in a small town and graduating with a class size of 191, I could not even fathom the transition that would occur upon attending an institution with an enrollment of over 40,000 students. After four years in high school spent hearing graduated friends come back and talk about how wildly different college was, I knew that it wasn't going to be similar to anything I had ever previously experienced; I knew that my goals, experiences, and purpose would all change or, in a more philosophical sense, become clearer.
I was unsure of how to establish new friendships on such a large scale and finding my niche among the vast array of students at UC. Entering Welcome Week, I knew just about everyone else was in the same boat as me, so I was as outgoing as possible and tried to keep that energy up through the year. Surprisingly, I found my best friends sooner than I ever could have expected and many of them were in my very major and learning community; Medical Sciences offers a fantastic community of incredibly tight-knit individuals who both support each other and introduce a competitive nature that encourages all of us to push ourselves. Over the course of this year we've all studied together, struggled together, and succeeded together, creating a bond between just about each and every one of us.
Freshman year was very class oriented, as that was the only thing we really had control over when planning earlier in high school. However, I'm surprised by how easily I became involved on campus and groups such as GlobeMed, a student-run public health group; the Glob Mob is easily one of the most fun, talented, and hardworking groups I have found on campus. Globemed, along with a How to Change the World class taught by Dr. Jon Weller, invigorated a passion for social justice and public health in me that I had never had an opportunity to nurture before. I’m entering the coming year with an E-board position as External gHU Co-director (along with my best friend Sunny) and am excited to see the change we can cause on campus, in our community, and around the globe.
My mindset out of high school was definitely very GPA and score-based, so I loaded up on courses for my freshman year. This coming year, I’m taking a slightly lighter course load because I’ve realized that signing up for a course is a commitment, and it really comes down to me how rewarding that experience will be—the beautiful thing about college is that I determine my own schedule and how I want to spend my time, so I can dedicate it to activities where I believe I can grow the most. This summer, I began researching at CCHMC in Dr. Woodward’s Lab through the SURF program, and it has already begun providing me with a sense of purpose that can often be hard to find in abstract introductory courses like Bio 1 and Chem 1. Performing research on a topic that can actively help provide better care and treatment options for patients and families has reaffirmed my passion for medicine and scientific learning moving forward. I think this gets to the essence of what I want my college experience to continue being: earnest, purposeful, memorable.