Student Blog
Getting Involved

Lessons from Smash Mouth: My Time at SSO ⟩
October 4, 2021, by Seth

Getting Involved

“The years start coming and they don’t stop coming”

It’s like they, “they” being notorious rock band Smash Mouth in their hit single “Allstar”, always say, “the years start coming and they don’t stop coming.” For example, take my time at the Chan Division. I entered USC’s BS-MA program five years ago and in the blink of an eye, I’m almost at the finish line. If we’re being honest, it’s actually 31 weeks away from the finish line, but really, who’s counting? 31 weeks to go doesn’t just mean graduation, it also means the future (AKA: the time to get my life together by and FAST)! As my next life stage looms in the distance, I did the one thing anyone else in my position would do: I stressed about it for a couple days until the universe sent me a sign (well, an Instagram DM).

“You’ll never know if you don’t go”

As it turned out, a mentor who knew I was looking for my next big break decided to pass along the information for an upcoming event, the Society for the Study of Occupation’s (SSO) “Occupation and Gender” virtual conference. For those of you who don’t know, I was an LGBTQ+ studies minor in undergrad. When I wasn’t doing OT, I was doing gender studies. Even when I’m doing OT now, I’m usually doing gender studies at the same time. With the future looming, I was starting to realize that I wanted to explore the socio-cultural aspects of OT more explicitly in the future and with that being said, this conference was made for me. When I needed it most, it simply appeared in front of me on a silver platter! Talk about serendipitous timing, right? Now that I knew it was out there, it was time to get to work, after all, “you’ll never know if you don’t go!”

“I ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed”

Later that week, I emailed the Chan Student Leadership Awards Committee to make a case for my attendance (including, but not limited to, bringing and sharing the information back to my fellow OTs for OuTreach members) and I secured the funding. From there, I just had to wait two weeks until the conference went live. What that really meant, however, is that I had a whole two weeks to think about how nervous and unprepared I was! This was going to be my first conference, my first foray into the world of OT outside of my five-year ivory tower residency (albeit a conference is basically within that tower’s property) and with each passing day I was worried that I wasn’t going to belong. Remember when I said the conference was made for me? Yeah, you can forget about that! All I could think about was how “I ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed!”

“You’ll never shine if you don’t glow”

Fast forward to the day of the conference and not much had changed except for the fact that I was now very aware that I was just a student amidst the leaders of contemporary occupational science. The conference was laid out so that I could asynchronously review poster sessions (AKA things I could prepare myself for beforehand) throughout the week and then tune in live for synchronous paper presentations and their joint discussion sessions (AKA being thrown in the deep end). I started off breezing through the poster sessions and then tuning in to the theme speaker to build some confidence. From there, I pushed myself out of my comfort zone and joined the conference mixer, got thrown into a breakout room, and became a face others would recognize throughout the conference. Objectively that was a good thing, but subjectively it meant I couldn’t get by turning my camera off and staying on mute. You win some, you lose some. Regardless my day was off!

I scheduled myself for eight sessions that day and halfway through disaster struck. Someone directly asked me if I had any thoughts on the topic at hand. I shook my head, laughed a bit, and typed in the chat, “I’m just a wallflower at the moment!” and the conversation carried on as if nothing had happened. But, spoiler alert, I actually understood what they were talking about and at times even thought before them what to say! It was almost as if the past five years weren’t just for fun. After I finally caught on that I could be a competent conference attendee, I decided it was time for that wallflower to bloom. I missed my opportunity, but I wasn’t going to miss it again. “You’ll never shine if you don’t glow” right, Smash Mouth?

“So much to do, so much to see”

With renewed vigour, I was on a mission to be heard! There was “so much to do, so much to see” and I was no longer content to watch it go by. During the next session, I shared a some insights on incorporating gender theories into occupational therapy curricula. I followed that up by asking four whole questions in a session on the environmental impacts on gender identity (and, I might add, stayed after the session to talk with the authors). The cherry on top of the day was when I gave a suggestion for additional research that the author actually wrote down!

“Hey now, you’re an all-star”

I won’t bore you with the rest of the details, but I will say that I carried that energy with me until the end of the conference. Although I am taking everything I learned from the conference back into the classroom and future practice, the most valuable thing that I took from that weekend was that I belonged in that space. It was the first time I ventured into the world of occupational therapy unsupervised and it showed me that I was ready for whatever is in store for me 31 weeks from now. Although we all live different lives with different experiences, know that you’re also ready for what is to come 31 weeks from now. You are prepared, you belong, and if you ever doubt it just remember, “Hey now, you’re an all-star.”

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What I learned during my time as a student ambassador ⟩
August 9, 2021, by Arianna

Beginnings and Endings Getting Involved

When I first started this job, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to handle all of the responsibilities that came with it. During the school year, there are typically 7 student ambassadors working at the same time. However, in the summer there is only one. I felt apprehensive going into this job but after a few weeks of work, I was pleasantly surprised with how comfortable I was in this position. For my last blog as the summer student ambassador, I thought I’d let any prospective student ambassadors know how this job helped me with my personal growth and what the position entails!

Information Sessions
One of the first tasks I had was hosting an information session for the Entry-Level OTD program with Dr. Anvarizadeh. I ended up doing 6 info sessions throughout the summer! At these info sessions, I presented a few slides and answered questions in the chat. Speaking about a program that doesn’t exist was a little intimidating, but Dr. Anvarizadeh, Dr, Nxumalo, and Dr. Bennett set great examples and their positive feedback helped me overcome any lingering feelings of imposter syndrome!

These information sessions helped me develop my public speaking skills and after a few info sessions, I noticed that I sounded more natural. Being completely honest, I did have notes that I referred to as I spoke, but doing info sessions taught me how to sound like I wasn’t reading a script. Eventually, I was able to host a BS-OTD info session by myself and I didn’t have to use any notes! To be fair, the BS-OTD program is extremely similar to the BS-MA program so most of the information was easy for me to explain.

Social Media
If you weren’t aware, I have been managing the social media accounts for the past 13 weeks. I enjoyed this responsibility because it allowed me to express my creative side! I also want to say a quick thank you to all the students who sent me pictures to post on our accounts. From your arts and crafts to Neuro PJ Day, the photos you’ve shared added so much vibrancy to our accounts! Managing social media accounts involves deciding what to post and when, designing the graphics for each post, and reposting all the wonderful posts we’re tagged in!

Handling the social media accounts taught me how to analyze trends! I noticed that our most popular posts celebrate the joys and accomplishments of the USC Chan Family. I hope that we continue to share these events with you all and I’m sure there will be an abundance of occasions to post about in the upcoming school year!

Meeting with prospective students
Out of all the different responsibilities I had, this one was my favorite. Meeting with prospective students involves setting up a one-to-one Zoom meeting and answering any questions one may have.

This aspect of my job was my favorite because I got to be an advocate for our program and I was able to share my experiences with potential future Trojans. I think this was the one task that I didn’t learn a whole lot from, which is not a bad thing! The meetings I had with prospective students flowed so naturally. I didn’t get nervous when I talked to them, and there was never any awkward silence because I can talk about Chan for hours and hours!

Admissions Projects
Working on projects for the admissions team was probably the area I was most inexperienced in. These projects involved collecting and organizing data so that our admissions team could use it in the future.

The most obvious skill I gained from working on admissions projects was how to use spreadsheets. I had almost no experience with spreadsheets when I started my job as a student ambassador. However, after 13 weeks of admissions projects, I’ve learned many tricks that I hope to use in the future!

Blogging
Last but not least, blogging was part of my job as a summer student ambassador. The student ambassadors have full control over what they write about, which makes it more of a therapeutic activity instead of work. We can give advice to students, talk about our favorite occupations, and even document a vacation (which I did)!

Blogging taught me how to write in different styles. The first blog I wrote was written with a slightly formal tone. However, I quickly realized that blogs are supposed to be fun to read! The audience does not want to feel like they are reading out of a textbook. Therefore, I let down all my walls and started writing with a more personal voice. Doing this made the writing process so much easier. I just let the words flow straight from my mind to the computer without worrying about how professional I sounded.

Well I guess this is the end of my blogging series! I enjoyed testing out my writing skills over these past 13 weeks and I hope some of the advice I wrote was helpful to many! Thank you all for reading and if there are any prospective student ambassadors reading this, I hope you learned a little more about the position!

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Vivir Con Diabetes ⟩
May 25, 2021, by Global Initiatives Team

Diversity Fieldwork Getting Involved

By Stephanie Gomez-Rubalcava and Liz Rivera
Professional Master’s students

Vivir Con Diabetes (in English: “Living With Diabetes”) is a community service project that we have been hosting as a part of the Albert Schweitzer Fellowship. This fellowship requires students to collaborate with a community site and create a project that caters to the needs of an underserved population. Our project was tailored to service individuals in the local, Spanish-speaking community of Boyle Heights who have been diagnosed with prediabetes or Type II diabetes. We believe that there is an increased need for healthcare providers who can implement culturally-sensitive interventions.

This program was started in 2018 by an occupational therapy student in the Chan Division, David Saldana. It was then continued the following year by Daniel Padilla Vega and Cecilia Garcia. We began as volunteers for the program in 2019 and were awarded the Schweitzer Fellowship in 2020. With USC OT students receiving this fellowship for the third year, it provided us the opportunity to continue expanding this amazing work. Our sessions covered topics related to lifestyle modifications to improve diabetes management such as: stress management, mental health, sleep hygiene, and increasing understanding of what it means to be diagnosed with diabetes. We really wanted to focus on prevention for those diagnosed with prediabetes and on modifying the habits and routines of those diagnosed with diabetes. In previous years, these sessions were hosted in person at our project site, the LAC+USC Wellness Center, but due to the global pandemic, we had to host the sessions virtually.

Although over the last year we faced several challenges in delivering the diabetes management content via Zoom, there were some great benefits to conducting this program virtually. Some of the challenges included making the program accessible for our target population, participant difficulties navigating Zoom, and internet connectivity issues. The silver lining to all of these challenges was that over the weeks, we created a family-like, virtual community and provided participants with space to reflect on their health goals. Many of them mentioned that our Saturday sessions were the only time they dedicated to themselves, and so we decided to incorporate at least 10 minutes of mindfulness/yoga activities to each session. We also provided every participant with at least one free, at-home hemoglobin A1c test to screen for diabetes.

Although a couple of weeks ago we celebrated our final Vivir Con Diabetes session, we are truly grateful for the opportunity to learn with and from our participants. As soon-to-be Latina graduates of occupational therapy, we are excited to continue working with our Latinx community in our future careers and helping them bring about positive and meaningful change in their lives. Lastly, Stephanie Perez, a previous volunteer of Vivir Con Diabetes, has recently been awarded a 2021-2022 Albert Schweitzer Fellowship (see contact information below). We are excited for her to bring innovative ideas to the program, and we encourage current or incoming students to contact her for an opportunity to volunteer with her project during the Fall and Spring semesters. Thank you to our mentor Dr. Jesus Diaz, Daniel, Cecilia, and all of our 2020-2021 student volunteers for making this program possible. Fight on Trojans!

Stephanie Perez, OTS: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

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Thnks fr the Mmrs (aka. Thanks for the Memories) ⟩
May 13, 2021, by Savi

Getting Involved

Coming into this program, I had no idea what to expect. I didn’t know if I truly had what it took to succeed and I thought that I would be lucky to just make it through to graduation. Little did I know that I would embark on a very unique and enlightening journey of being an ambassador for the Chan division.

I was lucky enough to be chosen as one of seven representatives for our division and I truly could not be more thankful. I have had the most incredible opportunity to organize and speak at over 20 events, correspond with and get to know over 40 prospective and incoming students, and write around 20 blogs for incoming, current, and prospective students to read for years to come. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to share my passion for OT and our program with hundreds of people around the world, and I am incredibly thankful for my OUTSTANDING ambassador team and admissions team for all of their support and for everything they have taught me. It truly has been an honor working with and learning from all of you. This job has brought me so much joy and although I am so sad it is coming to an end, I am extremely excited to see all the amazing things the incoming ambassador team will do throughout the next year.

I have made wonderful friends and connections and have learned extremely valuable skills that I will carry with me for the rest of my career. I have been inspired by those around me (read my blog about all these wonderful people) and have gained invaluable leadership skills through both this ambassador position and my coursework.

Reflecting on these two years I realized that time really does fly by . . . and that I am definitely not ready to leave the Chan family just yet! I will, therefore, be staying another year at USC to pursue the advanced clinical track of occupational therapy doctorate, completing my residency at California Rehabilitation Institute and Cedars-Sinai. Thankfully, that means I get to delay my goodbye from this Chan family for one more year.

Thank you all so much for reading my blogs this past year and thank you to Kimberly Kho for giving me the opportunity and platform to spread OT knowledge and love around the world. I am forever grateful. Fight on!!

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Finding your A-teams ⟩
April 23, 2021, by Savi

Classes Getting Involved Life Hacks

When you get to graduate school, you will quickly realize that you cannot succeed alone. You will gravitate towards and lean on all types of people throughout your two years and you will form long-lasting friendships. As graduation soon approaches, I have had to face the fact that I will no longer be blessed with the opportunity to work with all these wonderful people on a daily basis. I have formed a variety of different teams depending on the class, club, job, or activity I’m in and I wanted to thank all the people who have helped me succeed as a student, friend, classmate, and practitioner. Below I have included some pictures of my various teams. This is most definitely NOT a comprehensive list, because there are so many more wonderful people who have helped me along the way that are not pictured below. To those who are not pictured . . . you know who you are . . . I appreciate you all!

1. To those who got me through my first summer semester: I truly do not know how I would have made it through without ya’ll. Whether you were a friendly face to me on the first day (shout out to Lamoni for being the kindest to me when we were seated next to each other on the first day of class), a late-night study partner in Currie Hall, or a lab partner who tolerated me asking too many questions and talking everything out loud, you made the transition into graduate school a little less stressful.
2. To the MANY group project teams: Thank you for helping me expand my creativity. Time and time again I found myself researching topics I would have never come up with on my own. Whether that was focusing on the effectiveness of the sequential oral sensory approach with children who are diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder in OT 518 Quantitative Reasoning, or developing a wellness program for undergraduate college students in OT 537 Occupation for Community, I got the opportunity to surround myself by people with varying interests and skillsets which allowed me to grow as a practitioner.
3. My cohort: Shoutout to cohort B for being the best cohort I could EVER ask for. Your knowledge about and passion for OT inspired me daily and I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to hang out with all day every day.
4. My roommates: These people have seen it all! Shoutout to these gals for dealing with me at my best and my worst, for always being a shoulder to lean on, and for listening to all my crazy rants. I appreciate you both for making the little parts of life fun, for being my “OT practice patients” during this pandemic, and for supporting me always. I couldn’t have done these two years without you!
5. To my ambassador team: You all are my rocks. Thank you for having faith in my capabilities, for always stepping up to the plate, and for helping me out when you can see that I am stressed. You all always know the right thing to do and say, and it has been an honor working with and learning from all of you.
6. To the adventure buddies: Thank you for taking my mind off the craziness that is graduate school and helping me re-focus on my energy on meaningful occupations. You are the silent heroes in my life. Thank you for supporting me both inside and outside of the classroom. You are able to read me like a book by this point and understand when I need to take a break and just enjoy the outdoors. You are the ones to text me a funny joke when you know I am having a hard workday or to organize an event when it is time to celebrate even the smallest success. Thank you for pushing me outside of my comfort zone, surrounding me with love and celebration, and for being there through the tough times.
7. To my family . . . my lifelong team: There are not enough thank you’s to show how grateful I am for you three. To my sister, life mentor, and OT guide, I do not know where I would be without your wisdom and guidance. You always know the right thing to say and do and I will forever be thankful for you. Mom and Dad – you are my biggest support system. Without out you none of this success would have been possible. You are my biggest cheerleaders and I know that you two are what motivate me to push harder every day.

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