By Shalean Collins, BS, RD
As a Maternal and Child Health Leadership Training Program scholar, I am fortunate to have exciting opportunities for professional development. One recent event of particular interest was the American Public Health Association conference. The event, held in Boston last November, exposed me to the wide breadth of opportunities within the field of public health. I began the week by attending the Association of Teachers of Maternal and Child Health (ATMCH) Student-Faculty breakfast. This event allowed me to network with professionals and peers in MCH, and may have been one of the most professionally beneficial events I participated in at APHA. It was during this experience that I was able to interact with leaders in maternal and child health to gain honest, supportive insight into my academic and professional interests.
Following the ATMCH breakfast, I spent the remainder of APHA attending sessions on a wide variety of topics ranging from malnutrition to monitoring and evaluation. I had formed a schedule prior to attending the conference, and mostly visited the sessions I had incorporated into said schedule; however, I also found that my interests began to narrow as the conference progressed. I discovered via trial and error of attending informational sessions that I was more attracted to topics addressing refugee health. Therefore, after the first few sessions on nutrition in developing countries, I shifted focus and began to sit-in on discussions covering aspects of refugee health and humanitarian settings. This change in concentration was interesting to me because I have little, if any, experience working in this population. Nonetheless, with every session I attended at APHA my interest grew, and I would ideally like to gain experience working with refugee and displaced populations in the future.
My APHA experience allowed me to gain knowledge I may not have obtained in a didactic setting. I was able to connect with leaders in MCH and peers in various concentrations of public health. As a graduate student, attending APHA was an informative and enjoyable experience. Though I wish I could have fit more sessions into my schedule, I am already beginning to look forward to next year’s conference in New Orleans!
Shalean Collins is a first-year MPH student and MCHLT Scholar, concentrating in Maternal and Child Health as well as Nutrition.
