Gaining Experience During COVID-19
Brittany Rodriguez (Neuroscience, Brooklyn College, ’22)
In the midst of a global pandemic, we transferred to a virtual world, leaving students and faculty alike scrambling to adjust to Zoom University. Students preparing for graduate education, in particular, remained at a severe disadvantage as research, internships, and extracurricular activities were halted, preventing them from gaining relevant, expected experience prior to applying or matriculating to their respective programs.
There are traditional expectations in place for graduate applicants – for example, healthcare students like myself are expected to have a certain number of hours of clinical exposure or hands-on patient care – but when hospitals, clinics, and other healthcare facilities are closed to the public, what choice do students have? The secret is simple: creativity.
In the field of healthcare, virtual shadowing opportunities have become standard, where volunteer nurses, physician associates, and doctors livestream presentations for thousands of interested students. Speaking with your school’s healthcare advisor or joining an online forum for healthcare students can help you find one that fulfills your requirements. If patient experience is needed, consider seeking out a family member or friend who lives with a chronic condition and asking for the opportunity to help them manage it. In lieu of laboratory experience, form a research club with other students, read peer-reviewed publications, and discuss current research trends, or disperse an electronic survey and pursue data collection studies. Missed out on the chance to present at an upcoming conference or showcase? Speak with your employer and identify a problem area in the workplace, then present a solution to coworkers.
Though everyone may not have been affected equally, many applicants have been impacted in one way or another by COVID-19. Every school board, applicant panel, and the interviewer will be aware that some activities were disrupted. The most important aspect is how the applicant responded to the abrupt changes. Showcasing adaptability, creative thinking, and versatility will be more impressive than completion of these activities, and using one’s own experiences to demonstrate how these obstacles were overcome is indicative of an applicant with exactly the resilience and critical thinking skills many of these graduate programs are looking for.