Remember food isn't inside you, it is surrounded by you!

Alright, my teachers...professors...doctors that teach... I haven't decided what the most appropriate title is for them, all of those names don't seem to fit any of them..I will let you with whatever title I feel comfortable giving them...yeah

My courses:

Now, don't be fooled in these Wet Prep courses we are getting all the same information that the 1st semester students are getting except it is at a slower pace, because we only have four classes, no labs, that we really have to study for the other three are for building our skills and experience...and we only have classes scheduled four days a week.  When talking to our 1st semester friends they are pulling their hair out over four courses with labs five days a week because each class goes through about 70-80 slides a meeting. They look at the Vet Prep students from last semester and are pissed because they are relaxed because they know the game and have heard half of the material once already.  SO, needless to say I am glad that I have the LUXURY of time to get my study habits together, learn the different professor teaching styles and how to efficiently use my time so that I can eat and sleep! I can't wait until 1st semester, but I will take it one test at a time!

Medical Math also known as Intro to Pharmacology with Yoda! I mean...

Dr. Ibrahm Shokry
"You understand? (nod) You understand"
Schedule: Tue, Wed, Thur

I have his course three times a week and the first week of class he was non-existent.  The first day none of the coordinators noticed that he wasn't around and it wasn't until Dr. Gyimah came in for Microbiology that we told someone Dr. Shokry wasn't present during his time slot.  We were all too scared to leave in case the rules about the class being canceled if the teacher hasn't arrived 20 minutes into the class period.  We thought about it, dared each other and no one had the balls.
Turns out that a series of delays from the New York delayed a lot of teachers from catching their connections in Miami and American Airlines, being the geniouses they are, over book every flight by 27 seats which didn't allow for any of the stranded to catch a connection.  Dr. Shokry was apart of that mess.  Though it seems to have happened for a reason because he was notified by the powers that be that he had been picked in the lottery to attain his citizenship, so he stayed.  If you are going to miss the first part of the week might as well come back the next week, and he did.  Don't worry we have make up sessions for the time lost, and right before our first test!!! Oh yeaa!

   So this was the first week that we got to experience Dr. Shokry and pharmacology (that photo I povided doesn't do him cute old man justice, he is noticably older now).  First impressions are everything and I am always going to see Dr. Shokry and think YODA!  Oh yeah, you thought Dr. Prasad was Yoda, you havn't seen the little egyptian man Dr. Shokry, no you know what...we can have DUELING YODA'S! Oh yes, they would make a pair.  I needed a good gutteral laugh today and dueling Yoda's accomplished my goal.
   On a serious note, Dr. Shokry has an amazing memory and from what seems out of no where will draw up diagrams and names and generic names and all their derivatives and how they differ and then which are synthetic or not and my eyes just oggle out of my sockets.  None of this we have to know...yet, but on that first day he asked us to name a drug and told us everything there is to know about that compound.  I was impressed but it would have helped to be able to translate his english through his thick Egyptian accent. I am getting better though, I have learned that he likes participation and will talk directly at the people that answer and participate the most in the class.  When he is looking directly in my direction I can read his lips and listen to piece together his lessons.
   It is funny because there are some girls who record during class and when they play it back it sounds like something out of a WWII film real. Yep so much for that idea.
  He handed out a booklet of his notes and practice problems for the semester, and the formatting of the notes is KILLING me.  The information is in outline style with the bulets and dashes but no INDENTS so not only do I have to pay close attention to the lessons in class I have to spend some time interpreting the notes.  I am going to need more highlighters.  I am very visual and have visual memory recall so when I see a diagram and am told information about the diagram the next time I see it I don't have to think to hard to explain or answer questions because I can see it in my head.  Well, I do the same thing with paragraphs of information, I read and then use my color system to identify diffent types of information (definitions, charts, detail, examples..etc.) All of this work helps my brain interpret and remember the info.  So when I opened the packet and saw no visual help I knew this was going to take up some of my luxerous time!  No, worries, Dr. Shokry is a sweet man and all this effort will better prepare me for third semester pharacology!
   I have been told by the prior Vet Prep students that in pharacology Dr. Shokry sends two hours on all the information that he presents in our course, so doing well now will give us an advantage later. 


 Microbiology...just good ol' bacteria to make me feel at home!

 Dr. Joseph Gyimah
Schedule: Tue, Frid

Talking of little men, Dr. Gyimah is also a Yoda like figure but not as frumpy as Dr. Shokry.  He is from Nigeria and studied in the states but has a thick accent also but he talks very clearly and slowly, thinking about how he wants to exactly phrase something.  He too handed out a packet of his notes for us to follow along with and he is going to be another flashcard teacher.  Micro is all facts and definitions with few concepts, so not my favorite style of teaching.  I do enjoy that when he asks questions about famous bacteria and protozoa I seem to always have the answer.  Thanks PAT.  I guess what little time I spent in Micro lab and all the lessons I learned in necropsy stayed with me.  Reading ahead probably helped also, but the information is very familiar and I have to thank Pat, Rob, John, Rich and Prasad for introducing the information to me.  I enjoy this class and can't wait until we get into depth with kinds of bacteria and parasites...well I can wait for the parasites...but I can feel that this will be a course that I take with me through my time at Ross.
   One of my favorite moments so far in this course was  we were talking about the importance of Fimbriae and the difference between them and flagella and Dr. Gyimah put up his hands, said wait a moment, and then left the class.  He came pack with a football looking stuffed toy with two big eyes and all this string hanging down.  The string had two pieces that were much longer than the rest and Dr. Gyimah raised this toy and said it was his E.coli doll and proceeded to describe the two different structures.  I am going to be the DORK that has a bed with bacteria dolls propped up against my pillows.  Oh, and I will make it better by giving them all names that are alliterations of their species such as, Clarise Clamydia, Stacy Staph, Terry Tetinus, and you get the picture.

Physiology...MY FAVORITE!

Dr. Allen Reich
Schedule: Tue-Fri
"I don't know about you but I had a GREAT time today, see you tomorrow"

It is a good thing I like this course because we see him every day for the four days that we have class and twice on one day of the week becuase he takes part in a portion of our Evidence Based Medicine course.  This guy has more energy than I do...I know it is hard to believe that he has more energy than a "Chihuahua on steroids" thanks John, but he does.  It is imperitive to read ahead in this course because he asks questions abotu the material and uses clinical experience to emphasize points that he wants to make.  He bluntly dislikes cats, which is hysterical becuase when ever an animal is going to be eaten or used for an energy source it is a cat.  He too is brilliant but you don't realize it until the class is over, he never used one power point or presentation to convey information and yet you covered a lot of material.  I was very impressed the first day and knew there was no room for writing during that class, all you could do is jot down points and anything that you didn't follow during his examples.  He also thrives on some participation and likes questions. 
   My roommate after the first class (if you remember, he is the teacher that gave everyone a heart attack the first day and then used that to begin his lecture) was big eyed and lost.  You see she is fresh out of University of Minnisota and is used to writing down every word the professor says and well had no idea where to start with Dr. Reich.  She was upset and worried about this class because she is very detailed and is comfortable in the structure of a powerpoint.  If you wrote everything down in the lecture you would loose the point of the lecture because you are too busy analyzing it.  The next few classes with Dr. Reich were funny because there are a few people that do what my roommate, Natasha does, and he finally told them all to put their pens down and listen.  I turned to Natasha and you could see her hands interlocked and by her face so that she wasn't tempeted to pick up her pen and write.  I smiled and have been helping her get "the big picture".  He teaches concepts and then weaves in the details he wants you to know but relates them to the "big picture".  I am keeping up with preparation and feel good about the upcoming exam. 
   We looked at a few of the old exams and he is tricky or requires your full attention.  The questions felt like something out of the GRE or SAT, and sure enough he was part of the ETS committee in his past life. There was a question on a past test that had someting to do with lactose as a compound and then the very next question used lactose as the name of an enzyme and both Natasha and I answered it wrong because loactose is not an enzyme but a carbohydrate! Yeah, that is what I mean when you have to pay attention because he knows where your train of thought will be after one question. He also made it known that he goes straight to his office and writes down a few questions for the exam after every lecture.  He is different but so far is effective.

Evidence Based Medicine
Schedule: Wed

  Well how this course works is all of us were split into two groups and we meets all of us were split into two groups and we meet on different days. We get three cases to work up in four weeks to hopefully come to a diagnosis, but the point of the course is to teach us the steps of coming up to a diagnosis.  We also have objectives after each meeting that we have to research before the next meet so that we can teach the group what we learned. From what we learn and the steps they teach us to help us move along in the case we hope to come ot a diagnosis.  We are graded on participation and preparedness of each meeting.  Over the course of the semester we will work up three cases, on of which being a horse case and all I know about horses is Rhodococcus.  Yep...when all else fails Rhodococcus, I have to thank Toni for that one because that is her motto.  Since I know very little about small animals I am looking forward to learning the ins and outs of the small animal clinician.

Veterinary Terms

Dr. Erin McNally
Schedule: Thr

A relaxed course that is going to teach us how to navigate the language of the veterinarian. It is like an English course, spelling counts, but with veterinary terms.  Did you know the word epithelial breaks down into epi = "above", theli = "Nipple", al = "pertaining to", add that all up to pertaining to the top of the nipple.  Yeah, I wonder who decided that was an appropriate name.  It was probably one of Wendy's long lost descendents making history. 



Study Skills

A course that I am not sure what the point is yet.  Our first meeting was canceled, second was interupted with emergency AVMA accredidation preparation, and then we finally met and spent the whole time talked about ourselves and making "connections" with eachother.  Today's meeting we had a speaker from The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Bradford Goodwin. He talked to us about Lab Animal medicine and what a veterinarian's role in the animal research labs.  He flashed some fancy salary ranges and told us stories of when Hurricane Allison hit Houton the basement floors (where they kept all the lab animals) flooded and the devostation it caused the staff.  A lot of the staff for relationships with some of the animals and even go so far as to name them but they all take their jobs very seriously.  It sounded like something I would like to check out, I don't know how I feel about working with primates, but I like rats and beagles and ARMADILLOS! Not so crazy about naked mole rats or opposums...but I like to hang out with ferrets and then put them back...I don't want to risk smelling like ferret for too long.  I have a cousin, Sarah, in Houston, I believe and I would probably be able to stay with her while I externed at the lab.  That would be an awesome break, I haven't seen her in a couple of years. 

Applications
Schedule: Tue

I have no idea who or what this class is about except that it is suppose to give us hands on experience.  When I know I will tell you all about it.

We have an exam every four mondays, and they are block exams.  On monday exam days we will get a set time to finish all the exams (4).  For example Jan 27 we will have an exam time from 1-3pm.  We will have four tests each 20 questions in length and we get to start and finish them in any order we want but we only get two hours for all four.  Oh yeah, this is sounding like the SAT's or something, but I guess the prior students miss that exam type.  We will see.
Well, now you know about as much as I know about my courses and my experiences thus far.  Let's hope that the school gets accredited by AVMA!  I sure would like to save that money of having to take three exams to practice in California!

Hopefully this weekend I can get the Mr. RUSVM video uploaded so that you guys can experience the roudiness of the male competition!  It was highly entertaining.

KIT
kat