Embarking On A New Journey
Rebecca Bussa
2nd Year MPH Candidate - Epidemiology
Starting and finishing graduate school during a pandemic was not my expectation when
applying to the University of Michigan School of Public Health. Upon entering grad
school, I
craved experiences in both research and fieldwork. Unfortunately, the timing of the
COVID-19
pandemic did not allow for as many opportunities to participate in public health within
a
community.
I am so grateful to be a part of the Public Health in Action course and Mississippi
experience just a few short weeks after I graduate. In this experience, my classmates
and I will
be conducting focus groups in the Mississippi Delta to inform the next steps for scaling
up the
Food Rx Program in Tallahatchie County to two neighboring counties, Coahoma and Quitman
County. This project will be conducted in partnership with the University of Mississippi,
and we
will report the results from the focus groups to the community and organizers of the
Food Rx
program. I am excited to participate in a grassroots public health experience and
use many of the
skills I have gained and refined during my graduate program.
Initially, I am excited to embark on this project. This experience is a part of the
reason I
chose to study public health—interacting with a community and communicating information
to
them. However, as we get closer to our departure, I am a little nervous about how
the project will
play out on the ground. In my undergraduate education, I participated in Alternative
Spring
Break where I was deployed to various organizations around the United States and there
were
times where the project that we were told we would be working on during that week
had changed
once we got there, so I am not unprepared for this situation. However, it can still
be nerve-
wracking preparing for one type of project and knowing that there might be changes
we do not
anticipate until we start doing the work. With the guidance of Sadé who has participated
in these
experiences before and the support of my classmates that I have built relationships
with over the
past several weeks, I am confident that we can be adaptable to any situation we encounter.
I am very intrigued to see what public health work will look like in a rural community.
I,
personally, have only experienced health-related work in suburban and urban areas,
so I
anticipate feeling a bit out of my element at first. In immersive experiences like
this, I expect to
be comfortably uncomfortable when we first arrive. In order to grow, we need new experiences,
and these can be scary and uncomfortable at first. Being uncomfortable will allow
me to grow
exponentially as a public health professional and knowing that I am in a safe environment
with
my classmates will allow this to be a learning experience for me while partaking in
important
public health problems within the Mississippi Delta.
As I prepare for this experience, I will be reading about the Mississippi Delta area
and do
my best to understand the community I am entering, knowing that there will be so much
to learn
once we get there. After we complete our project, I will be writing another post about
what my
experience was, so stay tuned! I cannot wait to share my experience.