Back to school! After a much needed two week break during the December and January holidays, classes have resumed. We completed our first block of the semester, neurology, two Thursdays ago. We have our next block exam Monday, February 6 over psychology for Principles and Med-Pharm, and our first exam in our Cellular Control class next Monday, as well. The first block exam, over psychology, is one I enjoyed very much. I took great interest in learning about the many different psychological disorders of the brain. Many of the drugs that were covered were drugs of varying "fame" or "infamy," of classes including antipsychotics, opiates, and more. Learning about the painkillers was especially interesting because of the opioid epidemic currently occurring in our country. It really made me think about the alternative forms of pain management that may exist, or could exist in the future, that would treat patients for pain without creating the risk of life altering opiate addiction.

Our class schedule is busier this semester and it's affected my ability to volunteer at Kipp so far. Usually I volunteered at Kipp on Friday afternoons after the weekly guest speaker, but this semester I have a class on Friday afternoons. Now that these first few weeks of the semester have gone by and I have an idea on scheduling, I plan on starting to volunteer at Kipp again next week. We don't have any class the day after our exam so that should be a good starting point. I'm sad I haven't made it out yet this semester, the volunteering each Friday was always a great way to end the week. Hopefully next month I can report back with more good grades and double digit volunteering hours!

-Sami