You don’t need me to tell Eberly College of Science alumni how COVID-19 has introduced an element of unpredictability and stress to our lives, but let me give you some perspective on how this has impacted our Penn State prehealth students. Health professional schools look for nothing less than excellence in applicants, and students pursuing this path put in years of work to meet those standards. However, being isolated at home, health concerns, a downturn in the economy, and an overall cancellation of student involvement have made the typical premedical, dental, and physician-assistant paths far harder to pursue.

As I reminded students on our last day in the office, March 13, 2020, we would need to work together to manage this situation calmly, compassionately, and with preparedness, but not panic. How true this would be, I did not know; I also had no idea how long this would go on. At the time, we optimistically expected to be back by summer. Over the past year, though, our students have had to make more accommodations and changes to their plans than they ever imagined possible. 

We are now looking at a cycle of professional-school applicants in 2021 who have had less than two pre-COVID years in college. 

The first hurdle we collectively overcame was online classes. They certainly weren’t what we were used to, or what our students expected from college courses, but we worked together to make the transition as smooth as possible. We set up home offices, and our students worked to find some quiet work space in their now busy homes. We learned to work with our siblings, parents, and spouses in the room, and put up with crying babies, barking dogs, and the sounds of lawn care in the background. 

The challenges to our prehealth students go far beyond a transition to online learning. The pandemic has put a halt to many formative experiences: shadowing, volunteering, research, internships, job opportunities, and study abroad were cancelled, and even course labs were moved to virtual platforms. As these circumstances dragged on, our advising hours were increasingly devoted to addressing student apprehension. Common worries surfaced around the fear of missing out, the fear of being left behind, and concerns that they should postpone applications to medical and dental school to “catch up” on missed experiences. Students began to question whether they would be prepared to apply on their original timeline, and we began to stress that now, more than ever, we need to them be certain of their career choice. 

Students’ preprofessional experiences since March 2020 have generally fallen into two categories—those who were able to gain novel experiences due to this unprecedented crisis, and those who experienced sudden change in resources and access to planned experiences and were left floundering. Collectively, as an advising office, we absorbed story after story of personal stress and turmoil. Some students isolated for the entirety of the summer to protect their vulnerable family members, some had experienced direct loss of family members, and others found themselves working in questionable environments to help their family make ends meet. 

Over the summer, we began to wonder whether the extreme stress put on the health care industry would lead to a decrease in interest in the field. Encouragingly, however, students have shown an increased dedication. After the initial shock of cancelled summer plans and online labs, our appointments with students turned to focus on new and innovative ways to support their community and their premedical, predental, and prephysician-assistant goals. 

Now 11 months into the pandemic, we have students working at COVID-19 testing sites and vaccination sites, participating in book clubs dedicated to inequities in healthcare, bringing meals to homebound individuals, tutoring middle schoolers on Zoom, and participating in virtual shadowing on Zoom and YouTube. 

But for every one of our students who has found creative ways to stay involved and is in touch with our office, we also see students who have been impacted by the pandemic in ways that have marginalized them and isolated them from their peers. Virtual learning, stay-at-home orders, and job losses have kept students at home to care for siblings while participating in online classes, working in sometimes hazardous conditions, and without the privacy or protected time to pursue their academic and career ambitions. 

At a time when real-life obstacles make it increasingly difficult for students to stay focused on career-related goals, alumni can have a role to play. Imagine yourself in the shoes of these future health care professionals. What kind of support or creative opportunities can you envision that would help them stay on this challenging path and succeed? As an office, we are constantly looking for new ways for our students to engage directly with physicians, dentists, and other health professionals in safe, responsible ways. Working through individuals in the college’s development office, we hope to hear from alumni about novel opportunities that may connect our prehealth professions students with valuable experiences as they build their dossiers. 

An Update on Our Office

As we get close to another application cycle, we are providing mock interviews and feedback to our applicants ahead of the submission of their applications, and we welcome co-interviewers to provide guidance, feedback, and support as our applicants move closer to pressing Submit. 

If you have any interest in serving as a health profession comprehensive interview co-interviewer, please reach out to John R. Moses (jrm68@psu.edu) for more information about the role and how your experience can help support our new cohort of applicants.