Internship Learning Objectives

Carrie Rheingans

For those of us who do an internship/field placement, we have to write learning objectives before we start so we can focus on what we want to learn from our internship. For the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, we base these on our core competencies. I just submitted mine to my advisor and am now ready to start counting hours toward my internship! Since I’m doing over 1700 hours for my AmeriCorps service, I’ll have plenty to use to count toward my maximum 636 for HBHE… plus, I’m going to count some hours from my Field Experience in Latin America internship in Peru.

It was pretty easy to write my objectives based on the competencies. The way I started was by going through the competencies and seeing which ones will be covered by classes I’ve already taken. Many of them were covered already in my first semester! I discovered that the HBHE department has a couple that don’t currently have an HBHE class that covers them, so I decided to set those as my objectives. There are a couple more that I thought might work especially well for my agency, too, so I chose them as well. It was a pretty easy process, and it made me excited to start the new field placement in Lima in July! If you’d like to see my learning objectives as an example, I’ve posted them online here.

Bar Outreach!

Carrie Rheingans

As part of my internship and through AmeriCorps, I get to hand out condoms and HIV testing information at local venues. On Fridays, I go with at least one volunteer to a local club and talk to people about HIV testing, local agencies that do testing, proper condom use, etc. It’s always fun, and the last time I went, some other SPH students joined in the fun!

Carrie tracking client data for state reporting

An important part of the outreach activities is to make sure the interactions we have with people are informational and protect the anonymity of the clients. The state of Michigan’s Department of Community Health funds my agency (the HIV/AIDS Resource Center) to do outreach, and the state sets outreach goals for us each quarter. Outreach isn’t just handing out condoms – it needs to include a brief discussion about risk behavior and HIV testing if possible. Since these topics can be sensitive to discuss, it can be challenging to talk to someone about it, especially at a public venue like a dance club! We keep track of how many people we talk to about testing and risk behaviors so we can reach our goals each quarter.

A fellow SPH student helps promote the internal (aka 'female') condom

More than once I’ve seen some professors from SPH at various bars while doing outreach. It makes sense, because they’re cool people and need to go out and have fun too! The first time I was really nervous, because I could see them looking over at me every so often. I kept thinking “my professors are witnessing me doing public health!  Arghhh!  I hope I don’t mess up!” It was a great confidence booster when they came over as I was leaving and said they were impressed that we were talking to so many people and that people looked like they were really listening.

Field Placement/Internship

Most departments at U-M SPH have an internship or field placement requirement (Epidemiology, Health Management and Policy and Health Behavior and Health Education). I’m doing a split field placement with part of my placement being at the HIV/AIDS Resource Center (HARC) in Ypsilanti, Michigan and the other part at Via Libre, an AIDS organization in Lima, Peru. I’ll be going to Via Libre through the Field Experience in Latin America (FELA) program at SPH.

Carrie Rheingans

This post is just about my work at HARC (I’ll write about Via Libre once I get there in July). I’m a member of HARC’s Prevention Team, doing outreach, education, and HIV testing, counseling and referrals. I’ve been affiliated with HARC since September 2004, when I was first a volunteer there through Project Community, a community-based sociology program at U-M. Since that time, I’ve volunteered in the office, on the mobile outreach unit (a UPS-sized van), the HIV testing clinic and at other community locations. For a year and a half, I was a full-time staff member doing fund development and community events. Since August, I’ve officially been the AmeriCorps member and my main job responsibilities are to provide HIV testing, make presentations at community events, help with volunteer coordination, and support the Education & Marketing Committee of the Board of Directors. I also represent HARC on the Spanish Healthcare Outreach Collaborative, a group of providers from local health and community organizations that have services in Spanish.

I’m doing this field placement through a National Direct AmeriCorps Program adminsistered through the National AIDS Fund. There are teams in seven total cities in the U.S.: Detroit, Charlotte (NC), Chicago (IL), Santa Fe/Albuquerque (NM), Washington, D.C., Indianapolis (IN), and Tulsa (OK). It’s a full-time program, so I’m serving at HARC full-time while also attending classes full-time.  Yes, it’s difficult, but it’s worth it! To learn more about all the teams, check out our group blog.

Team Detroit in Santa Fe for pre-service training in August

2 Former Surgeons General Visited Campus!

Dr. Joycelyn Elders and Dr. Richard Carmona were at U-M for the Practice Office’s 5th Annual Practice Office Symposium on January 27th.

15th US Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders and 17th US Surgeon General Richard Carmona

This was a really fun event to attend! It was interesting to hear the opinions of former politicians about their political duties. The theme that kept coming back to me was what Dr. Elders kept saying: “We don’t have a health care system in this country, we have a sick care system!” As someone who studies public health, I have learned the many reasons to act preventively, from the financial to the overall health of society. Dr. Elders also mentioned that many politicians have already made up their minds about the political ramifications of their votes, and their mentality tends to be “Don’t confuse me with facts – I’ve already made up my mind!”

Carrie Rheingans

Dr. Edelman was the first speaker, and she kept talking about getting out of our “silos” and working with people who work in many academic fields.  Having gone to U-M for undergrad, I heard about this frequently.  There are many opportunities on campus to work across departments, as well as multi-disciplinary degrees.  The U-M SPH has many dual-degree options for those of us interested in interdisciplinary work. I just submitted my application to do the dual-degree program with the School of Social Work, so I’m naturally a little biased

I found it very interesting that Dr. Carmona’s desire to do some obesity prevention programs met many walls until he framed it as a national secruity issue.  He said that once he started talking about the fitness of firepeople and other first responders and how so many people fail the physical fitness tests for the armed forces, he started getting money to try to create physical fitness programs. He also talked about a “Medical Reserve Corps”, similar to the PeaceCorps and AmeriCorps, that would have members serving at clinics and other medical facilities across the country to forgive a part of their loans.  As a current AmeriCorps member, I fully support this idea (and maybe they can have a path for recent public health grads?).

The Ann Arbor News and The University Record both covered the event if you’d like to read more!

Greetings From Carrie!

Ann Arbor has beautiful autumns!

Hello all!

Carrie Rheingans

Thank you for visiting the University of Michigan School of Public Health student blog!  I’m excited to share my experiences with you during my time here.  I’ll try to avoid acronyms, and I’ll use real names for professors and classes, so you can learn more about them from their faculty pages.  I will, however, be changing my friends’ names to give a little privacy.

This is my 6th year as a University of Michigan student, since I went here for 5 years for my undergrad degree in German Language and Literature and Cellular and Molecular Biology.  I took a couple years off to work in the field at the People’s Food Co-op and the HIV/AIDS Resource Center (HARC).  I learned a lot about natural remedies at the co-op and gained valuable public health experience doing HIV testing, education/outreach, and event planning at HARC.  I’m in the department of Health Behavior and Health Education (HBHE), and I’m in the process of applying to the Unviersity of Michigan School of Social Work to do the dual degree.  Right now, I’m doing my field placement for HBHE as an AmeriCorps member serving with a team of seven AmeriCorps members in Detroit.  I grew up mainly in Michigan (except for two years in Georgia in elementary school), and I’ve lived in Freiburg, Germany and Durban, South Africa, both times doing research and playing lots of soccer!  I’m excited to be doing an additional field placement in Lima, Peru this summer through the Field Experience in Latin America (FELA) program.

As a student blogger, I hope to give you some insight into campus and Ann Arbor life, U-M Public Health courses, professors, and more.  Please leave comments to ask questions and add opinions – and take the polls!