An Introduction!

Hello, and welcome to our blog! We wanted to give our readers an introduction in our first entry of the blog:

Saludos! My name is Calla, and I just finished my third year of medical school at the University of Rochester. Bela and I wrote an application to spend the 2009-10 academic year in San Jose, Intibuca, Honduras, working on a project jointly run by the community of San Jose, the Department of Family Medicine here at Rochester, and an organization called Shoulder-to-Shoulder. We are following in the footsteps of another medical student from our same class, Matt, who spent the 2008-2009 academic year in San Jose. We are so excited to meet the people that he knows, and to follow up on his and the community’s great work over the past year!!

I grew up in Indiana, and then moved to New York City to go to college. I majored in Women’s and Gender studies as an undergrad, and during my coursework I had the opportunity to evaluate case studies of international development projects. In addition to classes I had the opportunity to volunteer as a crisis hotline counselor and an HIV pre- and post-test counselor, and these things solidified my interests in health promotion, reproductive health, and rights of the underserved.

After college I joined the Peace Corps, and spent 2 and ½ years in Ecuador, living and working on the southern coast. While there I worked on many projects, including HIV and reproductive health education, nutrition education, prenatal health promotion, tutoring, and was able to work to train health promoters and HIV test counselors. I also got to work on the Gender and Development Committee’s program for high school scholarships for girls. I met many wonderful people working to improve the community, and am lucky to have stayed in close contact with my friends and coworkers from the Peninsula. My friends and coworkers taught me so much! Apart from my time in Ecuador, I have worked in the Dominican Republic, Kenya, and Haiti, and so am incredibly excited to learn more about Honduras, as I have never been to Central America!

Thanks for reading, and more to come from Bela and from the two of us when we arrive in San Jose!!!!