Volunteer Love Education Learning and Self-Management Model

The “FU Chuan Charity Foundation” uses the statutory curriculum of the Department of Social Sciences to implement education on volunteer love and self-management for volunteer students. The statutory courses of the Department of Social Sciences belong to the “Interdisciplinary Curriculum Integration Model”, the “FU Chuan Charity Foundation” opened the “FU Chuan Charity Bachelor Class”, which has been operated by volunteers for 8 years, invisibly in the original “education and learning philosophy”. The outlines of 7 groups of education and learning models gradually emerged, so they were named “Education and Learning Models for the Bachelor of Evangelical Compassion”: including (1) the integration model of old and new students, (2) the cross-age and multi-group co-learning model, (3) Sharing mode in different places and different industries, (4) Social welfare resource co-study mode, (5) Potential mode of voluntary service, (6) Intervention response effect mode, (7) No-handling property mode. The operation of this model has changed from “Originally run a school for the Foundation” to “Run a school for the Friends Association”, and at least assist students in 5 changes: (1) Attitude to study, from “wait and see trial” to “specialized reading” “, then change to “Determined to Grad.” (2) The learning factor changes from “convenient time” to “professional needs”, then to “equal attention to time and professionalism”, and then to “desire to graduate”. (3) The average number of courses taken has changed from “inconsistent courses” to “concentrated courses” and then to “intensive courses”. (4) Student volunteer habits have changed from “adjustment to ups and downs” to “balanced and stable”. (5) The willingness of students to volunteer has changed from “rare concepts” to “stable learning” and then to “dare to face the test of the epidemic” [1].

Empowerment, love, and connection: Lessons learned from the Farmacy Project, a food-is-medicine program in Rutland, Vermont

Senior high school student volunteer Tyler Carroll walks out to the car that has pulled up along the back of the renovated former iron works building, the site of the Vermont Farmers Food Center, in downtown Rutland, Vermont. Tyler says, “Hi! Can I get your name, please?” Tyler then takes one bag from the table covered with bagged farm shares and puts one in the customer’s back seat, thanking them as they drive off with their local goods. The members are here to receive their produce prescription through the Farmacy Project, a program that provides 150 individuals in the county with 15 weeks of fresh produce grown exclusively by local Rutland county farms. Finishing up its sixth year in 2021, the program has become a standard in the area, working with healthcare providers who identify individuals with chronic diet-related health conditions who could benefit from a “food as medicine” produce share. This project intersects community health and local agriculture. Many, although not all, members may be food insecure as well, as reflected in the 68% of members this year who were food insecure based on the results of the two-item food insecurity questionnaire of the U.S. Household Food Security Survey.

Rapid Development, Training, and Implementation of a Remote Health Profession’s Student Volunteer Corps During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Public health in the United States has long been challenged by budget cuts and a declining workforce. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the vulnerabilities left by years of neglecting this crucial frontline defense against emerging infectious diseases. In the early days of the pandemic, the University of Texas Medical Branch and the Galveston County Health District (GCHD) partnered to bolster Galveston County’s public health response. We mobilized interprofessional teams of students and provided training to implement projects identified by GCHD as necessary for responding to the pandemic. We provided a safe outlet for students to contribute to their community by creating remote volunteer opportunities when students faced displacement from clinical rotations and in-person didactics converted to virtual formats. As students gradually returned to clinical rotations and didactic demands increased, it became necessary to expand volunteer efforts beyond what had initially been mostly hand-selected student teams. We have passed the initial emergency response phase of COVID-19 in Galveston County and are transitioning into more long-term opportunities as COVID-19 moves from pandemic to endemic. In this case study, we describe our successes and lessons learned.

To Volunteer or Not? Perspectives towards Pre-Registered Nursing Students Volunteering Frontline during COVID-19 Pandemic to Ease Healthcare Workforce: A Qualitative Study

COVID-19 has caused a shortage of healthcare workers and has strained healthcare systems globally. Pre-registered healthcare students with training have a duty of care and can support the healthcare workforce. This study explored factors influencing the willingness of final-year nursing students to volunteer during the COVID-19 pandemic, the role of professional identity in volunteering as healthcare workers, and strategies to improve future volunteering uptakes and processes. A qualitative study using focus-group discussions was conducted. Final-year nursing students who volunteered, students who did not volunteer, and lecturers who supervised student volunteers were recruited. Interviews were conducted online, video-recorded, and transcribed verbatim. A thematic analysis was used. The themes were “wavering thoughts on volunteering”, “bringing out ‘the nurse’ in students through volunteering” and “gearing up to volunteer”. Findings suggested the need to look beyond the simplicity of altruism to the role of professional identity, operational, and motivational factors to explain nursing students’ decision to volunteer and their volunteer behavior. Providing accommodation, monetary and academic-related incentives, supporting the transitionary phase from students to “professional volunteers”, promoting cohesive and positive staff–student volunteer relationships, and establishing a volunteer management team are strategies identified to improve volunteering uptake and operational processes. Our findings advocate strategic partnerships between hospitals/communities and academic institutions in providing various healthcare services during pandemics.

Geriatric Education on Telehealth (GET) Access: A medical student volunteer program to increase access to geriatric telehealth services at the onset of COVID-19

The coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic placed an unprecedented demand on health systems to rapidly shift ambulatory in-person care to virtual care. Geriatric patients face more challenges with video visit access compared to younger patients due to discomfort with technology and less access to devices and internet. Medical students at the University of Michigan created an initiative to improve access to and comfort with video visits for geriatric patients. The program's goals were to (a) explore options for the delivery of personalized training to older adults, (b) create materials for volunteers to successfully navigate conversations with patients and caregivers, (c) provide patients one-to-one remote guidance while identifying and overcoming barriers—with practice sessions to increase comfort, (d) share with the larger health system, and (e) ensure program sustainability. Over a 10-week evaluation period, providers whose patients worked with our geriatric education on telehealth access volunteers had a video visit rate of 43% compared to 19.2% prior to participation in the program (adjusted odds ratio = 3.38, 95% confidence interval = 2.49, 4.59), ultimately providing a platform for geriatric patients to foster stronger connections with their providers, while increasing Michigan Medicine's overall proportion of video telehealth visits.

The National Weather Service-North Carolina State University Internship Course: Impacts and Success over a Generation

Nearly 100 North Carolina State University students have participated in a unique, highly structured internship course conducted by the National Weather Service Forecast Office in Raleigh, NC. Here, we explore the impact that this course has had on their professional development and career trajectories. The course has now been running for 17 years, and this paper provides an update on how the course has changed over time, including an evolution of the interview process to participate in the course, the number of students enrolled each semester has systematically been lowered to allow for more individual attention, and additional experiences outside of the WFO have been added. There are benefits for the students, with about half of the students now employed by the NWS, and nearly universal praise for how the course impacted their career progression. The university benefits from the course because the course serves as a compelling selling point for the MEAS department when recruiting students and the department also ensures that the curriculum is adequately preparing potential students for the job market. Finally, the NWS gains by creating a pool of potential employees that will require less spin-up time if hired, and graduates of the NCSU program have gone on to be involved with similar student volunteer programs at their respective offices once hired.

Industry careers for molecular bioscientists: an interview with Jennifer Mitchell

Jennifer Mitchell is a scientist at Redx Pharma and Board Member of the European Laboratory Research and Innovation Group (ELRIG). She completed her integrated undergraduate and master’s degree in biological sciences at the University of Liverpool and took on a graduate industrial role as an associate scientist at a biotech company. After 2 years in this role, she went back into academia to complete a PhD before moving back to industry. Jennifer began her involvement with ELRIG, a not-for-profit organization serving the life science and drug discovery communities, as a student volunteer in 2017 and she has been part of the ELRIG General Committee since 2018. She is also part of the ELRIG early career professional (ECP) workgroup, which aims to engage the ECP scientific community through career development workshops and outreach events. In December 2020, the Biochemical Society hosted a session on industry careers in the molecular biosciences as part of its Biochemistry Focuswebinar series dedicated to early career researchers. The Biochemist spoke to Jennifer, panellist on the day, to find out more about her experience working in industry and her broader contributions to the community.