Careers and Fun

     Next week is one of America's most iconic holidays, Thanksgiving.  A holiday surrounded by food and family, what could be much better?  To me, not having school and getting to go home is a pretty great bonus as well.  Being at school for so long and only having been home once, I am looking forward to a relaxing holiday.  This year, my family gets to host Thanksgiving which means we do not have to travel anywhere.  That means I get to sit at home and enjoy being with family and at my house which I have not seen in a long time.  Besides eating and bonding I will participate in the annual Black Friday shopping excursion to get clothes and other on sale items this time of year.  I cannot wait to go home and just relax and not worry about classes! (Well attending class, I definitely have homework over Thanksgiving break).
     In other exciting news, class today was at the University's Career Center.  Basically this presentation outlined the resources the Career Center offered, the importance of searching for a career path now, and the importance of networking early and getting plugged in for future job opportunities.  Thankfully, my parents have been drilling in my brain the importance of knowing what career I want to be involved in and researching the in's and out's of the career before coming to college so I do not have to change it, at least not change it a lot.  I spent a majority of my senior year researching all about Pharmacy and the necessary schooling I would need and how exactly to get into Pharmacy Colleges.  By the time I came to USC I had already made a list of every graduate program I was going to apply too, what extra credits I would need, what GPA I would need, and what PCAT percentile I would need.  This way, I am already aware of how I need to be doing in my classes and staying on top of my goals.  I think I can confidently say that I plan to be a Pharmacist when I grow up, (granted I get into a graduate program).
     One of the main goals I set for myself at the beginning of this year was to find an internship opportunity by the end of this year for the summer.  I knew that in order to get into Pharmacy College having an internship was necessary, and also a great way for me to determine if I am in the right career path.  My dad is very well connected with many pharmacists in many different areas of the job so he is helping me a lot with finding internships.  I plan to contact these different pharmacists over Thanksgiving to set up interviews while I am home in December.  I need to start now in order to have an intership by this summer.
      Ironically, one of the main points I remember from the Career Center presentation is to get an internship.  Internships help you network and help you picture yourself in the career path and let you know if you could really see yourself in that field of work.  This idea really helped reassure me that my search for internships now is a great advantage I will have over my peers later on when I apply to Pharmacy College.  If there is one thing I tuned in well to in the presentation, it was the information on interships.