"Involved" by MSIH second year blogger Dvora Feinblum

I’ve never been one to get overly involved in extra-curricular activities. Student council, clubs, after-school events – they were just never my thing. Throughout my school-going career (and as a professional student this means throughout my entire life), my attitude has always been “get in, get out.”  I’d go to classes, and participate, but once that last bell rang, I would quickly make my way home to ‘do my own thing’.  In college, I even made sure to live in a different borough than where my school was located (school was in Manhattan, but I lived in Brooklyn).

I’m not sure why I’ve always been averse to getting involved.  I always had friends in school, and a rich social life outside of school, but the idea of being involved in clubs and societies always made me nervous.  Maybe it was the extra burden on my already full calendar, maybe I was concerned about having a decent amount of variety in my life, maybe I was simply lazy. When I started med school, not much changed.  I stayed uninvolved in clubs, shied away from student council, and overall maintained my “church and state” approach to school and my extracurricular ambitions.  Don’t get me wrong – I made sure to always shadow, and actively keep up with the latest in medicine outside of school, but these were maintained mostly as solitary pursuits, done with one or two colleagues at most.

At the end of last year, though, everything changed. I decided to volunteer to run our school’s Book Room, which meant becoming the AMSA (American Student Medical Association) treasurer.  I also began to mentor first year students in a wonderful program run by my school, which most of my classmates also participate in.  On top of that, I was asked to run the school’s Surgery Journal Club.  Before I knew it, I had gone from minimal involvement to being one of the more involved students in my class.

It’s only been a few weeks of this new year, and it’s been even less time since I actively got more involved in the goings on here at MSIH.  But I have to admit, it’s a lot easier than I thought.  Running the book room is really fun, and I get to meet and interact with students from other classes a lot more than I would have were I not running the book room.  Having mentees is also a lot more enjoyable than I had anticipated.  It’s nice to be able to pass on your hard-earned knowledge and tips to the underclassmen.  And I’m really looking forward to participating in the Surgery Journal Club.  Our mentor, Dr. Elliot Goodman, is a really wonderful contact to have, and having his insight, as well as those of my peers, on the articles we will be discussing is sure to be interesting and insightful.  And the best part of all of this is, I don’t feel overburdened or stressed at all!  Being involved in the community that is my school has been nothing but fulfilling.  So my tip to others who are nervous about getting involved: Do it!  You’ll not only be able to bulk up your resume, but you might just find that you enjoy it as well!


This will be my last post on this blog, so I just wanted to say thanks to all who read it, it has been a real pleasure to write these posts! 

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