Today was my first meeting with my fourth year, senior mentor and the rest of my group, and it was such a fantastic experience! There are four people in total in my group including Kaitlin Berris, who is our fourth year mentor, as well as Laree, Esther and myself making up the third years. Upon introducing ourselves, it became apparent that we all had quite different journeys getting into the program, as well as have quite different paths we hope to take once we graduate.  It was a very interesting experience for me because, it gave me appreciation for how different the backgrounds of people in the programs are, and diverse the profession is. For example, of the four of us, one person hopes to get into sports nutrition, one hopes to get involved in proactive healthcare through nutrition, while the remaining two were hoping to get involved in the clinical aspects nutrition. This affirmed for me one of my favorite aspects about the dietetics profession, which is how within a single profession, there are so many diverse career opportunities a person can take. I hope to take advantage of this opportunity, by getting involved in many different aspects, including clinical, preventative healthcare, as well as possibly publishing a cookbook focusing on Asian type cuisines.

In addition for giving us a greater appreciation for the professions diversity, Kaitlin was also able to give us some fantastic advice as we move forward in the program. She encouraged us to get involved with everyone in our class, and as a group try to organize events and gatherings to all get together. The small class size, and common interests of our class gives us a unique opportunity for getting to know each other on a deeper level than other programs do. For example arranging get together, and getting to know everyone if someone was in the medical class would be near impossible because there are three hundred people in the program. I think we as a group should take this opportunity given to us to maintain unity between everyone to make the program even more enjoyable, and to form relationships that could likely carry forward into our professional careers.

Kaitlin also encouraged us to get involved in learning opportunities outside of the classroom, to give us opportunities to expand our learning as well as network. She suggested attending some of the Inter-professional Passport events, as she had found these to be great opportunities to learn about some of the other health professions we will be collaborating with in the future, as well as to network with people that are in the Dietetics profession. Although it is early in the program, I hope to become involved in such events to gain experiences and interactions that cannot come from textbooks and lectures. I think this is great advice because such events will bring a human, and interaction component into the rather text based University model of teaching. Such opportunities enable individuals to tailor their learning in a way that gives them more exposure to areas they are interested in than can be offered through classes.

Overall I found this to be a very insightful experience thus far, and look forward to meeting and collaborating with my group members as we go through the Dietetics program together.