nayavill – Page 22 – Gillings Around the globe

Transitioning from Practicum to Classes Amid the Pandemic

Posted on August 20, 2020 by nayavill

Today marks the first day of classes back at UNC. Selecting which mask I should wear for my first day of class was not the way I imagined starting my second year of graduate school. As I begin the process of adjusting to a primarily virtual semester and put the finishing touches on my practicum deliverables, I have begun to reflect on how I can utilize the lessons I’ve learned working remotely the past few months to engage in meaningful learning in the “classroom” this year.

Working with the Anova Health Institute located in South Africa has both positively impacted and challenged me in ways I could never have anticipated. My practicum pushed me to strengthen my communication skills to better engage in collaborative work despite the thousands of miles between my kitchen table office and my colleagues in Johannesburg. As part of further developing my communication skills, I worked on practicing active listening to absorb as much as I could from what my team was sharing in the short time of a Zoom meeting. Not only do I seek to better integrate this mindset into my personal life, but I also believe it will be a valuable tool as I tackle the challenges of learning in a virtual setting.

Working next to my best friend, Tallulah!

Many of us likely feel the added pressure of being involved in public health work during this crisis. For me, I am feeling the urgency to equip myself with as many public health tools as I can, making this semester feel more important than ever. The professional and personal development I have gained during my remote practicum experience has helped me to realize how impactful a virtual opportunity can be. Rather than dwelling on what I will miss from being in a traditional classroom, I am reinvigorated by the knowledge that I have started to develop tools this summer to make the most of my public health education. As I wind down from my first day of class and think about what tomorrow’s will bring, I am hopeful that the lessons of collaborative communication and self-care that I began developing during my summer practicum will help me to have my best semester yet.

– Hannah

Experiencing life with the power of Zoom

Posted on August 19, 2020 by nayavill

As the end of summer quickly approaches, I have had the opportunity to slow down and reflect on my global health experience. For me and the rest of my cohort, the end of this internship also marked the conclusion of our time at Gillings in the MPH/RD program. Graduation was celebrated over Zoom, which was a bit more bitter than sweet due to no real closure or proper goodbyes. Despite this unexpected ending, I am thankful for the community I found at UNC and am sure many of us will cross paths in the future.

The COVID-19 pandemic also drastically changed my plans this summer which had involved traveling to Cebu, Philippines to conduct qualitative research related to infant feeding practices. When travel restrictions went into effect, I had to quickly change my research plans to fit into the new ‘work from home’ structure. My global health experience this summer ended up consisting of regular Zoom meetings with my preceptor, secondary data analysis, and writing a research paper. I was able to utilize data from the Cebu Longitudinal Health and Nutrition Survey which has over 30 years of infant feeding data spanning two generations of mothers and their children living in Cebu, Philippines. With this data, I studied the association of maternal education with breastfeeding practices across the two generations of mother-infant pairs. Although this experience did lack a “hands on” component in another country, I did gain a lot of useful skills that I can take with me into my future career. I was able to learn and improve many skills this summer including evaluating existing literature and putting it into the context of my research project, learning data analysis methods in Stata (a statistical software), communicating data analysis in a research paper format, and preparing the paper for submission for publication in a peer reviewed journal. My global health experience was nothing like I could have imagined, but I leave with many new skills that I am eager to use as I begin my public health career.

– Shannon

Past Self, Future Self Blog

Posted on August 18, 2020 by nayavill

By Jordan

5 things I would tell my pre-practicum, 3 months ago self

Your practicum work will be meaningful and fulfilling, but when your office is in your living room in your third-floor walk-up apartment, you will inevitably feel disconnected to the world around you. Find a personal hobby/project to work on that involves creating with your hands. It will help you feel more connected to the surrounding Earth.
Just because your global practicum is remote and will be completed in the US, that doesn’t mean you will not have to think about white saviorism in your work. Keep up the critical analysis of your industry as a whole and your contribution to it. This is an opportunity to reflect on how white saviorism in global health plays out in remote work spaces.
Before grad school, you were able to rely on your intuition to tell you when your brain needs to rest, when you would benefit from taking a break and coming back to work nourished. With an overloaded schedule and near-daily deadlines during your first year of school, you have not had the luxury of listening to your intuition. Take this summer of “real-life” working to tap back into your intuition, to get back in touch with what your brain and body needs. Whether that may be in rest, work, or personal development journey, you can use this summer as an opportunity to reconnect to balanced and healthy self-care
Working remotely means networking can be extra difficult. With international time zones and differing work schedules, it can feel overwhelming and burdensome to ask for an informational interview. Plus, Zoom coffee chats are just awkward (we’re all thinking it!). Remember that everyone is slowing down this summer, so don’t worry so much about falling behind. Take a note of people that you come across this summer that you would like to get to know better and write down their contact info for a later date.
Don’t underestimate how quickly you’ll complete 1000-piece puzzles this summer. Go ahead and buy a few! Go crazy in the Target games aisle!

5 questions I would ask my future, 3 months from now self

How has your experience in Gillings classes, such as the insight you bring into conversations, evolved after completing your practicum?
How have you worked on balancing your desire to explore the world with your need to be physically close to your family?
How have you navigated the transition back to group work and how have you dealt with the group work-related anxieties that this remote practicum has allowed you to avoid?
Have you continued to prioritize unlearning and decolonizing your mind in your personal development? Who is your current source of inspiration for unlearning harmful rhetorics related to race, gender, and disability?
Have you found a way to connect your Curamericas practicum back to your current classes? In particular, what are some of your discoveries or reflections from connecting your global health work to your business classes?