Psychology Department Holds Talk for Science Careers Discussion
The Science Center photographed in October 2024. (William Oehler/The Gettysburgian)
By Nathaniel Swindell, Staff Writer
On April 15, senior medical writer and editor Shannon Cole of the Johns Hopkins Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality gave a public talk in CUB 260 to help students discover the next step in their career path and the various jobs they could prepare for before graduation. At the event, which was sponsored by the psychology department, Cole encouraged students to maintain an optimistic view of the future, as a negative one would not help them.
“Life’s too short for you to hate it,” said Cole.
A major part of the presentation was taking first steps both during and after college, especially among students’ common fears of what their lives will be like after they graduate.
“I want to help you figure out your next step after college because I know that’s a common concern among all ages at all times,” said Cole. “And right now I think everyone’s wondering, ‘What do I do for the summer? What do I do after college? Do I go to graduate school? Do I do a training program? Do I look for work?’ And I learned a lot about different opportunities along the way.”
Cole noted the importance of making sure to choose a profession with things a person valued as well as one they were truly interested in. Additionally, he stressed the significance of taking a career path that would allow a decent work-life balance.
“Do you wanna work sixty hours a week, or do you want to take weekends off?” Cole asked.
The presentation also went into Cole’s early life and how he obtained his current role, particularly how his studies at the University of Michigan offered him many different choices to pick from until he eventually made it to medicine. He noted that having a wide range of connections between different people was very helpful, and urged students to create something similar if they had the chance.
“I’m talking about this to let you know about the importance of talking to people and establishing a network,” said Cole.
Cole pointed out the amount of background research and preparation he had to do in order to get where he is now, and it was only through his own work and his various connections that he managed to reach that point.
“In my opinion, if I hadn’t had the background in psychology, if I didn’t have some understanding of psychotechnology, if I didn’t have some understanding of how science works, if I hadn’t developed some people skills, if I hadn’t had some of the research experiences that I’m sure many of y’all have had,” said Cole. “All of those things helped me navigate and find all these different jobs and parse through them.”
Cole finished off by saying that students could contact him by email if they wanted advice on their career path and that he would be happy to assist them.
