By Isabella Dale
 |
| Erin Hart |
Erin Hart, a senior at the University of the Cumberlands, is facing her last semester of undergraduate college. Her plans to continue further education at the University of Kentucky Pharmacy School inspired me to hear more in-depth about her life and on what truly got her there. She says she hopes to one day help children with life threatening illnesses and provide care to their lives. Erin is involved in numerous activities on campus, like being a UC campus ambassador, a STAR, the no. 4 player on the tennis team, and the vice president of Gamma Sigma Epsilon, a chemistry honours society. Her efforts don’t go unnoticed, as she is also a triple major in biology, chemistry, and public health. I had the pleasure of interviewing Erin in the van on the way to a tennis match against St. Catherine College and here’s what she said:
Isabella Dale: What made you interested in pharmacy school in the first place? How did it all start?
ID: In what ways did working with them spark your interest?
EH: They set me up with a really good starting base as far as what it all consists of. I was able to better understand it all, much more than what I understood before, and that specifically was what really got me into the dream of working at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
ID: Is St. Jude where you want to work after pharmacy school?
EH: Yes, it’s in Memphis, Tennessee. It is basically a non-profit organisation which is something I support very much.
ID: What would your desired role be within that hospital?
EH: I would love to be working with kids in creating the best possible medicine for them. Most of them have terminal illnesses of cancer or life threatening injuries, so being able to help them would be the best thing ever.
ID: Is the hospital able to give free health care?
EH: Absolutely. St. Jude is basically for parents who can’t afford to give their children the proper care due to financial reasons. It’s a really, really great hospital to work for because they focus on truly caring for the child rather than the financial benefits they are receiving from sick people.
ID: How did you prepare for the interview that ultimately got you accepted into pharmacy school?
EH: Through the University of the Cumberlands, the chemistry department helped me do a mock interview that allowed me to get used to the types of questions that University of Kentucky Pharmacy School were going to ask me. The mock interview was actually an interview within itself, it was another barrier to get through because if I hadn’t successfully completed that I would not have gotten the recommendation letter to UK.
ID: So, by knowing that, what were your thoughts going into the mock interview?
EH: It was weird because it’s actually a different interview than what most people would normally have. There were different stations that all were designed to test your skills in many different areas.
ID: What types of things could you clearly identify that they were wanting to test you?
EH: We would do things that demonstrated to them our skills of working together. In the pharmacy world, you’re usually with a partner or having to cooperate with people as a team. So the mock interview, or you could say the obstacle, was back-to-back training exercises where one person would be telling you how to build a set while the other reads it out to you.
ID: That’s interesting.
EH: Yeah, it kind of goes along with how well you work with other people and it really tests your communication skills under a little bit of pressure. The other ones are more scenario training. So you have the scenario of a real life situation in a pharmacy or hospital, and the supervisors want to know how you would you react or what you would do in specific situations, therefore it tests your critical thinking skills too.
ID: In the years leading up to it, what would you say was responsible for your success in achieving this goal of going to pharmacy school?
EH: I’d definitely say my parents, and my friends. All of them so helpful to me. My dad always pushed me to do the very best that I could and my mom was always there for me when I didn’t do so well, and she kind of helped me through it all. As well, my friends have always encouraged me and we always challenge each other everyday, so I think that for sure, the most influential part would be my family, because they’ve been so supportive, whether it be emotionally or financially, they’ve never been able to not allow me to do something, which I consider myself very blessed.
ID: Are there any personal factors, excluding family and friends, that you’d say you achieved yourself?
EH: Yeah, definitely. I would say that for me personally, good grades don’t come easy. So I do have to study more than others do in order to achieve what I would like to. My GPA was something I had to work very hard for because I started out and I didn’t really know what college was going to be like. I didn’t have to really study in high school, so it was a real big adjustment for me. So I realised very quickly my freshman year, that it wasn’t going to be like that. I knew that I’d have to work hard for my goals.
ID: Did you ever have to make specific sacrifices?
EH: As far as being out with my friends having fun, then yeah, all the time. There was, I remember, a good two years of college where I just never had fun. I forced myself inside every night after tennis practice to study. But now when you ask me, I don’t call them sacrifices anymore because I believe they worked out to my advantage.
ID: What advice would you give to someone hoping to be in your shoes right now of their academic career?
EH: I would say to work hard, but not work hard all the time. Don’t get burnt out my something you want, like a goal that will bring you happiness or satisfaction. Also, have a positive attitude. Too many times I hear stories and know of people who burn out of the things that once made them happy and motivated to do well. And just because of a negative attitude. An important thing as well is to get involved. Get hands on, its the most important thing you can possibly do. If you’re not involved, you won’t learn it, and if you don’t learn it, there’s no way you can be good or even decent at it.
ID: I don’t know you too well, but we see each other everyday and we are friends. I always notice how you are so positive, which is understandable now after you say that. But what makes you so “always” positive?
EH: (Laughs) Well, a lot of it is caffeine. I need my coffee in the morning. I guess a lot of what you see me do, that you’d consider positive, is just a blast of energy from coffee. But I guess a lot of it, as well, is keeping myself busy. The worst thing I think anyone can do is allowing yourself to have too much free time. By filling up your day with tasks, you not only develop skills for them, but you also pull yourself out to that comfort zone.
ID: What’s the hardest multitask you’ve ever done?
EH: I would say juggling tennis with school, work, community service, and a personal life. Because everything but tennis, to me, was important. The other things I needed to do, like I needed to do good in school and do good in work as well as spare a personal life with friends and family. Tennis to me was unnecessary but I didn’t want to drop it because it enjoyed it. It was hard, because I wasn’t just playing for fun, I was playing for the school. It took an enormous amount of my time away from being able to study alone, because I would get back from matches and be exhausted, I mean you know how it is. It demands a lot of your time.
ID: But you still managed to persevere to your senior year of college.
EH: Yeah, which I am proud of myself for being able to do. I did think of dropping it a couple of times. I really did consider it.
ID: What positions do you hold that we might not know about apart from your place on the tennis team and your job at the school?
EH: I am the president of house council, it’s no big deal but that might be something people don’t know about me. Except Victoria (her roommate).
ID: What would you say a good pharmacist needs to have?
EH: Obviously knowledge of the medicine they are giving out is crucial, but I suppose no one can become a pharmacist if that isn’t already a standard. I would say the next most important thing would be communication. Being able to comfort the person who’s receiving help from you is a must in our field of work. Half the time you’re giving out medication that’s completely new to people and they need reassurance that it’ll work or that it’s safe. Safety is a huge thing that needs to be addressed, so you have to be able to explain to them.
ID: What was the hardest part in all of this?
EH: Definitely the PCat. It’s a pharmacy exam which is worldwide, and in order to become a pharmacist you have to fall within the 78% percentile of the rest of the world, which when you think about it that way it’s pretty tough. Studying for it was a nightmare. I must have been a recluse for 4 months, seriously. My family were concerned. But, I’m proud to say I achieved it.
ID: How was it challenging?
EH: A lot of the questions weren’t testing your solid facts but instead you had to think about it, they were more logical questions. A lot of the time many scenarios seemed fit to me, but then when I thought about it again this couldn’t happen and that couldn’t happen. So I would say that test was a killer.
ID: Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
EH: I hope to get a residency sooner than that, so then in 5 years I suppose I’d be doing clinical pharmacy at St. Jude. If that doesn’t work out thought, I would also like to work in just a retail pharmacy. That’s always fun too.
ID: Retail pharmacy? So would you own your own business?
EH: Oh no, definitely not. I am not great in the business world at all. I would just be working for someone if I ended up in a retail pharmacy, because I don’t enjoy the business side of it, which if I owned I would have to take care of. I doubt I’d be good at it anyways, I’d like to just stick to what I am passionate about and that’s the medical as well as emotional side of it.
