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Jin Hyuk Pak was among the many medical students who participated in the Fall American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) Career Night at the John A. Burns School of Medicine. As a first-year medical student, his horizons are broad. “I’m one of the MS1s that are open to most fields, so I was really looking forward to this AAMC Career Night,” he said.
He had the opportunity to speak with physicians in three different specialties, including physical medicine and rehabilitation, emergency medicine and psychiatry. The best part, he says, was connecting one-on-one with them and having unfiltered conversations about their profession and daily lives.
“I think it’s really hard (intimidating) for students like me, MS1s, to approach doctors with their long white coats and ask them ‘what’s your day to day like, what do you like to do for fun?’” said Pak. “But in these types of settings (career night) everyone’s eating together, kind of family-style. You’re going from table to table, getting to talk to everyone and everyone is so approachable because you know that they’re all willing to be here.”
Dr. Wendell Foo understands that feeling of intimidation as a young student, all too well. That’s one of the reasons he and his wife, Susan, have generously coordinated this event at the John A. Burns School of Medicine, which has occurred biannually for the past 28 years. The casual, informal atmosphere is quite intentional to put both students and physicians at ease.
“I, myself, was at JABSOM and I didn’t know I was going to end up being an anesthesiologist– I never got the chance. While I was in surgery, I never paid attention to the screen. Who's the gentleman behind it? I was too anxious and nervous about the surgery,” said Foo.
At the career night, around 76 physicians representing 30 various specialties came to share their experiences with JABSOM students.
Second from the right: Dr. Wendell Foo, with fellow anesthesiologists and medical students.
“The students have that opportunity to really get to meet the doctors from all the different specialties. So they get a chance to ask all the questions that they won’t get to while they’re studying over the next four years,” Foo said. “It’s a very exciting night for all the students and the doctors, and the doctors really want to share their insights with each student as to what their specialty is really like.”
Kristal Xie, a second-year medical student, also reiterated the value of attending the career night.
“It's a time where you can ask the questions that you really want to ask and get to know about the day-to-day life experiences of the physicians: How they got to where they are, how they decided to pick their specialty– which you don't really get to do during rotations because everyone's so busy,” Xie said. “But this (career night) is a really good opportunity for students to get to know these physicians, learn what their path was like and see if that is something that they're interested in pursuing.”
On the flip side, as a physician returning to her alma mater to share her experiences, Dr. Nalani Blaisdell said, “It's so inspiring to be with young people who are at the beginning of their career and are thinking about themselves and studying all the time and yet, imagining a future for themselves. The wonderful thing about this group of students is, not only are they obviously fantastically intelligent with very perceptive questions, but to the person, they're very nice individuals.”
She says that it was encouraging to see so many community physicians at the event, “and I think that speaks to the excellent relationship JABSOM has with the community.”
Blaisdell added, “And the community physicians, we all have a lot of aloha for JABSOM, whether we’ve been here or whether we interact with the students and I think that’s one thing that makes this medical school very special.”
