As I mentioned last week, I’m participating in a fun survey as a way to let my readers get to know me a little better. Each week I will answer four questions.
This week’s question is Four jobs I have had. Most of my jobs have been administrative, which is one reason I decided that it was time to graduate school; I was having a hard time moving up. So anyway, here are my last four jobs.
Graduate Assistant: As my current job, I’m a graduate research assistant for one of my favorite professors in my MPH program. This mostly consists of helping my professor with research, literature reviews, data entry, etc. One of my favorite tasks has been going to the state department of public health and reviewing every county’s community health assessment to find out what issues are considered a priority in each individual county. It was very interesting to see how each area prioritized health issues like cancer, diabetes, and obesity.
Communications Assistant: For three years I was the administrative assistant for the communications department of an international nonprofit organization that worked for women’s health and rights. It was my most favorite job by far because I learned so much about an area I’m incredibly passionate about. This is where I had difficulties advancing because I didn’t have an advanced degree so I decided to go to graduate school to get my Master of Public Health so I could continue my career trajectory in women’s health.
Administrative Assistant: Prior to working for a nonprofit, I worked in community mental health. My Bachelor’s degree is in Psychology which is an incredibly broad field. This was something I both loved and hated. I loved it because I could do just about anything. I hate it because I could do just about anything! I decided after undergrad that I would work for a while to get an idea of where I wanted to go next, and that’s how I ended up as the admin assistant for a specialized program working with high-functioning adults with mental illness. It was a great learning experience because I found out that I didn’t want to be a Psychologist/Psychiatrist as I had originally thought.
Health Center Assistant: My very first job out of undergrad was working in a women’s health clinic, checking in/out patients, doing patient work-ups (i.e. blood pressure, height, weight, etc.), and my favorite (yet least utilized) duty was discussing birth control options with patients. I was only at this job for a few months because they asked me to learn how to draw blood and administer shots and I just wasn’t comfortable with that. I didn’t go to nursing school for a reason!
What jobs have you had? Have you ever felt stuck, and what did you do to overcome it?
[…] my entire undergrad career. That all changed when I was about 26 years old and started working as a communications assistant at a non-profit in a few towns over, requiring at least an hour commute, one-way. I had to get up […]
I loved reading about your different jobs, Nikki! I like that you’ve had such a great time with your graduate assistantship, too – I was a GA for two years and LOVED the experience! One year, I worked in New Student Orientation and Advising, and the other year, I helped a professor with research and co-advised a student advisory committee with her 🙂 Such fun!
My GA-ship has definitely been a great experience, but I’ve realized that I don’t really like research! I actually prefer being out in the community, working directly with people. That’s why I’m really interested in program planning and implementation, and my professor is really good at that stuff so I’m learning so much.