No one has ever accused me of being concise...

Yes, yes, yes. I know. I have been slacking on the blogging. My apologies. I was busy studying for a test and then last week I spent my time in a bunch of various meetings! Here is a (very) brief snapshot of what I've been up to!

1. MTV Staying Alive Foundation (SAF) grant writing. The do juSTIce program applied for a grant from MTV SAF last year and was awarded substantial monies to start our youth program at the Douglas County Youth Correctional Facility. Well, the re-grant was due on Monday, and so the past several weeks has been spent thinking of ideas to expand the programming for the next three years and writing the actual grant. I have the most awesomest team (yes, awesomest!) and they did the bulk of the work, but there was plenty of brainstorming happening in my peanut-sized noggin! 
2. Current news crying. Speaking of do juSTIce...today I read this article on NPR that made me cry. This is absolutely terrifying to me. We have SO much more work to do in the area of sex education...teenagers don't realize that by not saying "no," a person IS NOT saying yes. They also don't know that legally, drunk/high consent is not valid. Some of the students we educated just last week were surprised at the concept that "consent" is ONLY a resounding "YES" and not just the absence of a "no." And the worst part, is that it's not just teenagers that don't know this. It's my generation. It's adults. It's pre-teens. 1 in 6 American women and 1 in 33 American men are victims of sexual assault within their lifetime. Those stats are staggering. We need to start having a serious conversation about sexual assault in this country. 
3. Preceptor. I precepted last week (shadowed the doc I'm assigned to). I learned lots of applicable and interesting stuff! Some well checks, some run-of-the-mill sick checks, some embryological malformations, some cystic fibrosis. Interesting stuff! And plenty of talk about which flu vaccinations are covered by which insurance providers. [Here's my plug for getting your flu shot this year...DO IT!]
4. Wood Auction. The Lutheran Center at UNL had their annual "Wood Auction" fundraiser. Always nice to support campus ministry, see gorgeous art and eat delicious food! I wish I wasn't a poor med student so I could buy the gorgeous art!
5. LGTB certificate. I don't remember if I've written about this yet...I've been accepted to be in a program that is dedicated to learning more about LGTB medicine and healthcare disparities. We've been doing online discussion boards for a few weeks, but last week was our first class in person! It was great! I'm SO excited to learn more! 
6. Accreditation. UNMC College of Medicine is up for re-accreditation this year...so our MD degrees actually mean something. And I was part of the group of students that got to talk to the big, fancy committee! For the record, I was 1000% behind the idea that we should be re-accredited! :) I'm sure we will, since we are a rockstar school!

So I said this would be brief. I sort of lied. Not intentionally though. It's just been a busy week! We're smack dab in the middle of the thorax and abdomen section of anatomy...so I'm learning about hearts and guts. Let me know if you'd like me to check you for a heart murmur...I'm getting pretty good at identifying them!