VA Internship :)

Started my first day at my internship today at the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) Medical Center in Iowa City! I hit the ground running with an 8:00AM meeting with administration and toured the hospital and got oriented to the new work environment. I'll be working with an alumni of our program (MHA) in the College of Public Health and with the Associate Director of Operations (i.e. COO) of the VA Medical Center. Everyone is very energetic and willing to answer questions, in which I had a lot being my first day and will probably be the case throughout the summer.

Learning the structure and how the VA works is definitely a task in itself, but it helped me respect and realize how much is offered through the Department of Veteran Affairs. If you ever have a moment, I would highly encourage you to look (www.va.gov). No matter the health system, new place of employment or just starting out grad school, you should always spend time getting to know how the structure or governance operates and functions. These become important when working with others, how decisions are made and when you might need to request funds for a project.

To wrap up this up with some more advice and just things I have learned thus far on my journey through life, I would have to say that "First Impressions are Lasting Impressions", this is true most of the time and the VA certainly made a great impression on me and I hope I gave the same back :)

Ryan

Mid-Terms...Spring Break!

So as I googled Spring Break, this was one of the first images that popped up, oddly I can only guess this a mob in Panama City that MTV typically displays...unfortunately I will not be going south of the Iowa/Missouri border but am enjoying the warmer 50's/60s headed our way this week! ;)

In addition, if you haven't noticed I have been a little MIA lately. Mid-terms definitely stole my time away but for good reason. They are always busy no matter how much I try to prepare for them. I faired pretty well and am glad to say that we are on Spring Break, even though I am still working on some homework for after break since I will be gone at the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE) Congress International Conference in Chicago. It is an exciting few days, but I will make sure to leave blogs about the experience later within that week.

Interviewing!

Some of the happenings that have been going on during mid-terms have been an MPH Seminar about improving interview skills, which came in really handy because I had an interview the day after (Wednesday) with a local hospital (St. Luke's - Cedar Rapids). Unfortunately I did not receive the interview, but was up against four of my classmates and was glad that someone from Iowa was able to be there. I am still keeping my hopes up for a couple more internship applications/interviews I have coming up and will definitely put the skills I learned in the interviewing seminar to good use, especially since I was kind of the "guinea pig" for the exercise. We used this program called "Perfect Interview," which is great online tool which video records your responses to interview questions. (1) I thought this was a great way for you to see yourself and all the little habits, whether good or bad that you do and (2) it can be sent to others for review (i.e. career counselor, practitioners in the field, etc.).

There were a couple other things that occurred but I will leave them for my next blog post tomorrow :)

Hope you all are enjoying this warmer weather, at least those of us in the Mid-West!

Ryan

First Couple Weeks!

Hi All,

I hope you all read a little bit of my bio before reading this post, but just in case I am entering my 2nd year as a dual degree MPH in Policy and MHA candidate within the College of Public Health (CPH) at Iowa! I'm starting the third week of classes and so much has happened that I think I would need a couple book chapters just to fill you in on my life. For tidbit of my summer, I interned at TRICARE Management Activity in San Diego, CA which if you would like to know more, just write a comment on the blog and I'll make it my next entry :)

In the meantime, here are some of the highlights that have gone on:

CPH Picnic/Brothers:

This was my first year attending the picnic in which all of CPH is invited to lower city park for brats, burgers, hot dogs and veggie burgers too! It was great to see all the professors and deans in their picnic gear and to be able to meet some of their family members. Also, I always like going to these events because everyone is out of the classroom setting and everyone can kick back and have a good time. I took a lot of pics, which can been seen on our MPH Facebook Page

After the picnic, a lot of us that are in the College of Public Health Student Association (CPHSA) went downtown to a bar called "Brothers" for some drinks and to meet others who couldn't make it to the picnic. It was great to reconnect with friends that I hadn't had time to catch up with since we all got back and Brothers is probably one of my favorite bars downtown when I want to go out for the night.

Football:

So this past weekend was the first Home football game, which was against Eastern Illinois. We dominated them and I forgot how much fun a big-ten football game can feel. I celebrated with others in the program, which I am specifically from the Health Management and Policy (HMP) department within the CPH, but I found myself running into others as the game went on. I will try and post pictures up soon, but for now imagine a sea of gold t-shirts, 10's of thousands of fans all breathing and yelling for the Hawkeyes! I never was a huge football fan until I experienced the magnitude of how serious they take football here, it is definitely a culture ;)

I am looking forward to more fall like weather coming up so I can hit up the apple orchard and enjoy the season in which my birthday falls! I can't wait for this Friday, for the annual Iowa Student Association of Healthcare Leaders (ISAHL) Golf Outing at Brown Deer, which I will blog about in my next entry...until then Good Morning Good Morning, because there's always someone waking up around the world!

Ryan