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Life as a Juniata Student Interviewer
I interviewed with Terri Bollman-Dalansky for the student assistant admissions counselor position in the middle of the Summer over zoom in 2020. I had a nice shirt on and tried to find a relatively blank wall to set up my laptop in front of. I think in my head I had hoped that “normal life” would resume in time to get back on campus and meet perspective students.
After learning that the pandemic was far from over, I realized that being a student interviewer would look different compared to friends who had the job in previous years. When I found out that I had the Juniata Associate position I was still planning on spending my Fall semester at Raystown Field Station. Being remote from campus and with the limited number of prospective students coming to Juniata, myself and the two other student interviewers were not able to conduct any interviews during the Fall semester.
How Juniata Helped Me Get into Dental School
When I was in high school, I realized that I wanted to be a dentist. However, I did not have the slightest clue how I was going to get there. The journey to become a dentist involves a variety of steps. Dental schools are competitive, looking for well-rounded, compassionate, insightful candidates. Before you plan to matriculate into dental school, you must take the Dental Admission Test (DAT), score in the competitive range, and apply to schools of interest. If a school likes your application and feels that you are qualified, they will offer you an interview to determine if you are the right ‘fit’ for that particular school. Once admitted, you must complete another 4+ years of schooling in order to become a dentist. Daunting, right? As a high schooler, I was overwhelmed.
At Juniata College, I was fortunate to receive ample guidance which made this process simpler. In my first semester, I met with Dr. Jim Borgardt who was assigned as my academic advisor. Dr. Borgardt advises all of the pre-dentistry students at Juniata, which means that he knows a lot about the admissions process for dental school. We meet every semester, helping to track my progress and keep me on pace for my goals. He also is an awesome guy who has made my overall experience at Juniata a great one.
(more…)What I wish I knew – Jules Slater ’21
This blog post started as a “What I wish I had known before starting college,” but after staring at my screen for longer than I’d like to admit with no ideas popping forward, I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s nothing I really and truly wish I had known.
Some may say that they wish they had known who their friends were going to be, or how to study for a college exam, or how to pay their taxes, but I truly believe that everything I’ve learned between my senior year of high school and my senior year of college have shaped me into who I am. I would not be the person I am today without these formative learning experiences. Sure, it would have been so much easier on my GPA had I known how to study for a college exam, but learning through actually doing is what taught me things about myself that I didn’t know before and taught me how to deal with failure.
(more…)An MBA with a Healthcare Administration Concentration is a Solid “Now” Decision
In Pennsylvania, we recently saw Alison Beam succeed Dr. Rachel Levine at the Pennsylvania Health Department. Beam holds a Bachelor of Science in Health Policy and Administration and is just one example of the pathways available to those exploring a healthcare administration career.
The truth is the need for healthcare administration professionals exists across the nation, making it one of the upward trending career decisions in the United States.
Why all this growth and will it last?
The complications in healthcare, data, and artificial intelligence to drive decisions and an aging yet long-living population have driven the demands. Add to that all that we have learned during COVID-19, the expectations for growth are expected to continue well past 2030. People with a passion for healthcare administration and the right education are sought out by hospital systems, physician networks, nursing homes, home health agencies, and governmental positions. Consider compliance alone. As national administration changes every 4-8 years, so does the regulatory environment. Healthcare systems rely on administrators to ensure that they remain compliant while driving up quality care.
(more…)Reflecting on my first semester during COVID-19
I was in Florida on spring break with my teammates when we all first learned that we would not be returning to campus for two weeks. We had no idea at the time that we would not see each other again in person for almost six months. This is not a wildly unique experience I had – high schoolers and college kids alike missed out on their senior years, sport seasons, time with family members and friends, and the long list of experiences a person has while they are still young. The pandemic we have all been trudging through for the last year has put life on hold in so many ways, and yet life at Juniata has not become all that different as many of us thought it would.
I was ecstatic to come back to campus for in-person learning. Attempting to learn from a computer screen in my childhood bedroom hours away from campus for the second half of the spring 2020 semester was neither productive for me academically nor for my mental health. When I found out that Juniata was expecting to make a full return to campus, I – along with every single person that I told from home – was doubtful to say the least. How would a small liberal arts school in the (in what they like to say) “middle of nowhere” be able to control local outbreaks without endangering staff or the local community? How did we expect college kids to listen to all the rules in place? I bet we’d be on campus for three weeks max (which was very noticeable in what I chose to pack). And for maybe the first time in my life, I was very happy to be wrong about something. We were able to stay completely in person for the entire semester!
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