{"id":26410,"date":"2020-09-30T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-09-30T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.oncolink.org\/?p=12216"},"modified":"2024-11-03T15:16:17","modified_gmt":"2024-11-03T15:16:17","slug":"a-college-senior-vs-a-global-pandemic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/a-college-senior-vs-a-global-pandemic\/","title":{"rendered":"A College Senior vs. A Global Pandemic"},"content":{"rendered":"

March 16th<\/sup>: The first day of spring break for Thomas Jefferson University. Little did I know\u2026 my spring break week would actually turn into a three-and-a-half-month hiatus from my Radiation Therapy program.<\/p>\n

\n
Haley Zukowski-Echols<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

As a senior in college nearing the end of my program, all I could think about was walking across the Pennsylvania Convention Center stage and receiving my diploma. Typically, Jefferson students will have their graduation ceremony in May but continue classwork and clinical hours throughout the summer until August. No one, myself included, really expected COVID to throw a wrench in our plans the way it did. But sure enough, in mid-March measures were taken to ensure the students\u2019 safety: classes turned virtual and clinical was suspended.<\/p>\n

Everyone in my program felt uneasy and each day \u201coff\u201d added to the anxiety. When can we get back to clinical? How will we have our boards review? Can we still have our graduation ceremony? Will we even finish on time?<\/p>\n

It seemed like no one had an answer to any of our questions. In the meantime, we learned from lectures online and took exams at home, we joined virtual lab sessions to keep up on our clinical practices, and we had weekly Zoom meetings with our program instructor to discuss any new updates. Our Honors Society induction came and went, then it was rescheduled virtually. Our boards review date came and went, then it was rescheduled virtually. Our graduation ceremony date came and went, and later on was rescheduled \u2013 you guessed it \u2013 virtually.<\/p>\n

And then FINALLY at the end of June, all the guessing came to a halt and we got the \u201cokay\u201d to start back at clinical in July. My instructor, who typically required double the number of competencies recommended by the national credentialing program, revised our clinical requirements to match exactly what was needed to become certified, we were given 2 face shields, fit tested and given n95 masks, and were not allowed in any known COVID-positive patients\u2019 treatments in order to keep us as safe as possible while still continuing our education and competency evaluations.<\/p>\n

I was committed to finishing my program on time and with a lot of determination and just the right amount of treatments coming through, I did just that! I finished all of my competencies with a week to spare. I got A\u2019s on all of my cumulative exams. I finished my program Summa Cum Laude and received my diploma in the mail. I scheduled my boards for September 17th<\/sup> and passed with a 92%.<\/p>\n

Despite COVID\u2019s efforts to hinder my education, I was able to persevere through the changes and am now Haley Zukowski-Echols, RT(T)!<\/p>\n

\n

My name is Haley Zukowski-Echols. I am 22 years old and I live in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I am a recent graduate of Thomas Jefferson University\u2019s Radiologic Sciences program, through which I received a Bachelor\u2019s degree in both Radiography and Radiation Therapy.<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

March 16th: The first day of spring break for Thomas Jefferson University. Little did I know\u2026 my spring break week would actually turn into a three-and-a-half-month hiatus from my Radiation Therapy program. Haley Zukowski-Echols As a senior in college nearing the end of my program, all I could think about was walking across the Pennsylvania […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5137],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26410","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26410"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26410\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46008,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26410\/revisions\/46008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}