Finishing Thoughts

April community service hours: 15

Spring Semester total hours: 15

2016-2017 Academic year total community service hours: 47

Well, this is it. The final blog. I came, I saw and I failed. In my last post I wrote out my plan to achieve 30 hours but that failed and I was only able to muster up 15 in this last month. I had planned on also trying to volunter in building a home but that failed as well. As I pulled up to the construction site, thoughts about my lack of experience in construction overwhelmed me and I returned to the comfort of my role at the Habitat for Humanity ReStore warehouse. I know my how to do my job there and believe I am pretty good at it. Over the year I also acquired friends there which added to my level of comfortability. It was nice returning to the warehouse and seeing the improvements they had made since I had been gone and being able to catch up with some of my friends. The store is constantly changing as new donations are being dropped off everyday and merchandise is being sold. All in all I enjoyed my time volunteering there and plan to continue to volunteer there every now and then throughout the semester. I would say see you nect time, but there is no next time fortunately/unfortunately. Bitter sweet to say the least. Good bye friends. And Goodluck. 

Julian S.

(New Shelves!!!!)

I was hoping to write this post before 12 a.m, but that will not be possible. Where is Daylight Savings Time when you need it?? The Rat Race is here. The first leg ends April 28th and the second and final leg ends June 16th. April 28th is the final day of class. By this time I need to have completed 30 hours of serivce work and need to gave found another job. In my MCAT, job search, temporary Bourbon Bartending,  Pharmacology scramble I have dleayed one very important thing. My service hours. This month will be a dash to complete them but I am determined. I will complete all 30 this month. I have signed up for two days of Habitat for Humanity on the last week of school. All the other days ore not available but I am going to call and try to fanagle two more days out of them. Who knows? They might offer me a job after! This is the first leg. Now on to the 2nd.

June 16th. June 16th. June 16th. I eat sleep and live this date. Why is this date so engrained into my daily routines you say? June 16th is not only the date I will be taking the MCAT but June 16th is the day I am free. I no longer have any more obligations requiring me to stay in New Orleans. Born and raised, I love my city. Its just time for a little break. LSU's tormenting silence has lead me to belive that I will not be matriculating in August, therefore preparations for this upcoming school year have already begun.  First things First. MCAT, then job. I have run across a very intersting postion at LSU calling for a Clinical Trials Coordinator. Its very people oriented and requires a Master's. This position may greatly help me if I were to possibly win it but there is only one problem. It's in New Orleans. I want out. Too young and too big of world to be stuck in this corner for so long. But hey it's a start. Clinical Trials Coordinators are needed throughout the country and this would greatly make up for my lack of research experience. Patience and persistence Julian. Patience and persistence.

Beginning of the End II

We just completed our third and final bock exam for Principles of Pharmacology and the semester is coming to a close. Its hard to believe that the end of the year is rapidly approaching. As to whats going to happen after the school year ends, I have applied for the Global Health Partnership internship in Managua, Nicaragua and hopefully will land the position.  I still have not heard back from LSU New Orleans and at this point I don't expect to either. I also have to decide whether or not I am going to take the MCAT again.

February brought on my favorite time of thde year. Mardi Gras season. I started working again on Bourbon St. during all star weekend in order to make some fast money  and just finished up working six day Mardi Gras stint. I nearly forgot to write this blog. As far as volunteering goes, I still have to find a clinic that will accept me. Daughters of Charity recently called me and if I don't find anything else I'll most likely volunteer with them. I could also go back to Habitat for Humanity's Restore, but I am looking to do something a little more clinical -based. Til next month.

New Year, New Semester

The new year has come and gone, and we now find ourselves in the throes of a new semester. April 28th will be here sooner than we expect, however. With that being said the hunt for a clinic to volunteer at must come to an end soon. While my time spent volunteering at Habitat Restore was quite eventful, I would really like to find a medical clinic to volunteer at. Who knew that it could be so difficult to find a place to give your time to. Hopefully the search will come to an end in the next few weeks.

As for school, it has been going relatively well. The semester is going by rather fast and before you know it we will have reached our last day of class. This second semester seems to be going a little smoother than the first one. Of course we are all now experienced Tulane graduate students and have learned how to navigate our courses and make the most out of our time. As for medical school, I am still waiting to hear back from LSU and hopefully will soon. I called them admissions office today and the nice lady there told me my application “was still under active consideration”. I don’t know if that is a good thing or a bad one. TIme will tell and hopefully tell soon.

Half Way Home

The semester has come to a close and what a quick one it has been. It is hard to believe that their is only one semester left in the program. We have learned a lot of information this semester that  I will be able to use in my second year of medical school ( as long as I get in.)

Now as far as volunteer hours go, I had some ground to make up as I was running behind and needed at least an additional 16 hours to complete the 30 required. The reason this is so important is that both Louisiana state medical schools offer a sort of "g.p.a forgiveness". If you complete 32 hours of post-bacc coursework they will use that g.p.a in place of your undergraduate one.

Over the course of days I put in 18 hours at the Re-Store warehouse and really began to feel comfortable there. The first day back in November was a little hard for me as it is not like "traditional"volunteering. There is no one really telling you what to do and you are own your own for the most part. You have to learn how to work at the store. You have to learn what needs to be done( taking out, the trash, sweeping, helping customers with question, helping customers load their purchases, helping unload the donations-hard to do when cold and rining, moving the donations onto the floor, general organization, etc.) Once I learned how to work the store I really began to enjoy the independence and made good friends with a core volunteer named Melvin. The first couple of days I followed him around and he became my "trainer" of sorts.

Overall I really enjoyed my time at the Re-Store warehouse and really enjoyed the physical labor aspect of it. I hope to return every now and then just to help out and say hello as I don't know if I will definitely be returning in the spring.  See ya'll in the New Year

December hours: 18
Semester hours: 32

Beginning of the End

In a blink of an eye the semester will be over and hopefully all the information crammed into my brain over the past four months will stay there. It has been quite an eventful semester and I fully believe that this program will help me on my journey to become a physician. 

Now as volunteer hours go, I finally heard back from Sister Bonnie at the Daughters of Charity but my heart was not in it anymore. I decided to pursue another route and began to volunteer at Habitat for Humanity's ReStore Center. The ReStore center located at 2900 Elysian Fields helps to provide funding for Habitat for Humanity's philanthropic efforts by selling items which have been donated to them. These items range from used stoves, refrigerators, couches and desks to doors, shingles windows. They basically accept anything that can be reused and sold. My duties there includes helping to unload donating goods from the truck, helping customers  load their purchases and general maintenance of the facility. The store manager James is a very friendly guy and the employees appreciate all the help they can get. Habitat is doing a good thing for th community and I am glad that our program has motivated me to get involved in such an effort. 

(They have some good stuff for sale!)

Total November Hours: 7

Total Fall Hours: 14

The Struggle

 Wow. What an obstacle attempting to volunteer as been. I have waited the whole month of October for the sister at Daughters of Charity to process my application and have my background check cleared in order that I may start volunteer orientation. The number of times I have called this place has been ridiculous. Every time I call its a different story. I finally received an email today stating that they have not forgotten about me and that I should be placed into an orientation soon. Too late. I gave up hope on the poor daughters about two weeks ago.After the numerous and varying responses given to me by the Daughters of Charity, I gave up a little hope on volunteering at a clinic and started focus my attempts elsewhere.

The heroin epidemic is running rampant throughout the United States. It has affected me personally as I have a had a good friend die from this epidemic. Therefore I started googling needle exchanges around the New Orleans are and found one that really caught my eye. The name was Trystereo and they identified themselves as a harm reduction group. I attempted to volunteer and as much as I would have liked to, there also seems to be a lot of red tape involved with this organization. I do not have any more time to waste therefore I have had to resort to Habitat for Humanity. I have signed up to volunteer 3 days in November. I will continue on my journey to find a clinic to volunteer at for the upcoming yeat.