Another Quick Update!

  I'm sorry for the silence, it was mostly the fact that my computer pretty much died on me and I needed to buy some parts and reformat the whole thing that began the downtime. It's been a frustrating, depressing, and chaotic few months. But I did finally get hired as a pharmacy technician after six months of looking for work. My first day was yesterday October 31st. I'll try updating when I can, but that might not be until the weekend.

Pharmacy Technician - Initial Interview with Aerotek Scientific - Quick Update

I'm still here! But been busy! Second interview, getting additional references, going in for drug testing tomorrow, and still have to finish up classes of course. full updates when I have more time to do all. But things are looking promising on the Pharm Tech end!

Pharmacy Technician - Initial Interview with Aerotek Scientific - Part 1

The NCPPS report interruption continues. I had my interview on Friday with Aerotek Scientific.

I made it there thirty minutes early, and wasn't too nervous. Made sure I had my documents and just be calm. I went into the building 15 minutes before the interview, went into the office, and was told my interviewer would be maybe 5 minutes late. No big deal. More time for me to just relax and made sure I was completely stress free. I was even offered a glass of water which I gladly took. I hadn't had many fluids that morning, and I didn't want my mouth drying out.

The first part of the interview was conducted by the same person that interviewed me over the phone. This was the part where she wanted to get a good handle on me, what kind of person I was, and wanted me to elaborate on my resume.

The very first question she asked, was asking if I knew much about Aerotek Scientific. I immediately cursed myself for not researching the company more before going in. I, at the very least, was able to tell her that my cousin actually got his first temp job through them. (Which is true. I talked to him on Wednesday, and he mentioned it, and that's exactly why I didn't research more. He vouched for them and that was good enough for me.)

She explained that do the hiring for a lot of science related fields, and while it isn't always the case, when it comes to the UCSF Pharmacy, they're the ones that do all the interviews and hiring decision, and the checks will come from them. But I can still put down on resumes they I worked for the UCSF Pharmacy.

With that introduction we went onto learning about me.

As a quick reminder, the thing about my resume is that I have almost no work experience. Pretty much the only real work I've had is working on a contract by contract basis for fashion shows conducted by Macy's. She wanted me to describe work, and I told her about the very efficient and structured nature of how it is behind the scenes of a fashion show, when you're part of the team that cues the models to walk the runway. The main directors watch from above, they call over headset to the door handlers when the cue the models, then the models walk out. But also at the same time, the runners at each entrance have to make sure each model checks in two segments (song/clothing style/theme) in advance, and door managers report back to the head director. Models are given numbers for each communication back and forth. I dont' know if I explained that well... but I also don't know how many people really want to know these inner workings, so I'm trying to be brief.

In summary, I wanted to describe is a team based, multi-tasking role that I had, as one of those runners.

She asked about what kind of stressful situations I've had to work in. That was when I described my role in the 42nd Annual International Children's games. How I was part of a team that had to organize and coordinate all the translators for the 60+ (80+?) teams of pre-teens/teens from all around the world. We had to set up and be there to make sure each team was properly greeted as all those teams arrived nearly 24/7 in the span of three days. Highly stressful. She asked how I handled that stress, and I simply told her during the downtimes we made sure to support each other and make sure everyone was getting at least some breaks and proper rest.  Was that a good response? I don't know, but it was the one that I had.

Shen then asked me to describe a situation where I had more of a leadership role. That's when I described to her that I have also been a part of a community service organization that holds an annual Multi-Cultural AIDS Awareness Day even on the campus of SFSU that I coordinated for three years. It's a role that takes months of planning, and delegation of 30-60 individuals on the day of. And of course it's for a good cause. I could have sworn that I talked about this before, but I can't seem to find a post about it. In short we organize organizations from both on and off the campus to come educate about HIV/AIDS in various facets (prevention, counseling, etc), have people offer up free testing, have speakers come and talk about current issues, and have multi-cultural entertainment as a symbol of the indiscriminant nature of the disease.

From there she asked me that it seems like I've been involved with a lot of groups, and she wanted me to describe a situation where I had to deal with... I forget exactly how it was worded. I want to say motivation problems, but I don't think that was it. That was more how I answered the question. Talking about I have been president of that same community service organization, and certainly it was at a time that we weren't at our peak.

She also asked me how I keep myself motivated. And I think this was probably my most unique response of all. I let her know that I have a pharmacy blog that I update, both as a way to keep my thoughts organized for when it comes time to filling out applications, and as way to immediately help others who have the same interest as me. I'm sure most people have vaguer and less tangible responses when it comes to that question.

I can't remember the placement of these next questions, but they were all asked at some point. She wanted to ask again what kind of shifts I was interested, what it was like commuting to school, if I was open to full-time or part-time or contract work, etc. I may not have given the best response when I said I didn't much like taking public transportation because of how long it took. She then mentioned that parking is difficult around UCSF.

I will say that I have done my research (SPOILER! I called back for the final follow up interview scheduled for Monday), and saw that taking BART (a subway/train system in the Bay Area) and bus actually isn't that bad. UCSF is located much closer to me than San Francisco State is. The travel time is essentially cut in half. And all day parking at UCSF is $22, plus $5 for toll, $8 of gas... while taking public transportation will be around $10. Not driving is probably the way to go. And now that with this information, I'm prepared to give them a knowledgeable response.

And with that, this post is getting long... since the interview was in two parts, I think I'll turn this into two-part post. This first part of the interview, in fact, went on for maybe 30 to 40 minutes and was one on one. The second part of the interview included a new person telling me more specifics about the job. That will come up next.

Pharmacy Technician Birthday Surprise!

Job Interview!

I have to interrupt the 5th Annual NCPPS reporting to report some good news! Today is my birthday and what do I wake up to? And email from a staffing agency, the wonderful Aerotek Scientific (which helped my cousin get his first temp job), and they contacted me saying they're looking to fill some pharmacy technician positions!

The surprise is that I never submitted my information to them. They got my info from the Pre-Pharmacy Association that I helped to found.

It caught me off guard and I was nervous, so I drank some water and ate some breakfast before I made the call. My phone interviewer was a lovely person, and after the standard questions of when you'll be available, what kind of shifts do you want, how far are you willing to commute, and what kind of pay you're looking for (My answer: Anything and everything, and I'm not looking for pay, I'm looking for experience and the opportunity to work with a pharmacist so I can get a letter of recommendation.), it turns out that the position is at UCSF itself!

I have an in person interview Friday, I just need to bring in proof that I have my license, two professional referrals, and answers to questions such as - Why Pharmacy? - Explain some situations where you had to multi-task in a hectic enviroment - and so on.

I don't know a better way I could have started my birthday.

The plan: Find my proof, because it seems to be misplaced, find a second person to give me a professional referral (already asked one), and make sure I have some clothes for the interview.


Quick Update

As for the 5th Annual NCCPS reporting, for my previous reports, I always brought my netbook and typed as speakers talked, making it easy to come home and reformat the information into complete sentences and paragraphs. My netbook battery no longer holds a charge. So I took my ipod nano and recorded audio and wrote notes on the supplied notepad. I'm going to have to relisten to the audio and hope it recorded decently before I can sort out all the information. It'll get up here, but it may take some time as I still have school to manage, so please bear with me.


And Thanks

This is long overdue, but thanks Elaine and California Pharmacy Schools and most recently Lucia for leaving positive comments. It's surprising how a simple comment of appreciation can help to motivate me to keep up with the updates.

5th Northern California Pre-Pharmacy Symposium - Part 2

Ok, that was a lot of information for one day. It's going to take me a while to break it all down. I will say that it was a fantastic event, and there were more workshops that I would have liked to have attended that I wasn't able to go to. I'll probably go again next year. It was certainly worth the $15 registration fee and $8 parking.

I do have some other things I need to take care of today, but for a quick sneak peek, here's how my day went.

I woke up and couldn't find my wallet (Email said to bring ID), so I spent my morning flustered, and eventually just left with my passport instead. The event itself was contained within three floors of the same building, breakfast was the regular (and perfectly acceptable) muffins, bagels, fruit, juice, and water.

The keynote speakers were fantastic. Very good presence and rapport with each other, and lots of great information.

The pharmacist panel was equally worthwhile to witness.

The Dual Degree workshop wasn't paced as best as it could have been so three of the six topics had to be rushed, but there were some handouts to take home.

Lunch may have been the most info packed session of all, because I sat at the table with an IT Pharmacist. Something I hadn't known existed until today.

The Northstate session I chose really broke down their new Team Based Learning approach to teaching (They used to have some lecture incorporated into their curriculum for their first year, and it's all gone now.)

Pharmacy School Fair is what you would expect (in a good way) and was able to get info from all the out of state schools, something I'm very much lacking in.

Ran into some friends during the break, two brothers (one of which was accepted into Pharmacy school this year), and got some info from them.

And closed with the Drug Development workshop. There was lot of information, but I feel like I new most of that already thanks to studying to be a pharm tech. I wish I had chosen to go to the Disaster Preparedness workshop instead.

All in all, like I said, it was an excellent day and well worth it. I would recommend it to anyone, and will go again next year if I have the chance.

5th Northern California Pre-Pharmacy Symposium - Part 1

A real update! Tomorrow I'm going to the 5th Annual NCPPS at UC Berkeley, hosted by The Pre-Pharmacy Informational Learning & Leadership Society (PILLS).  . Here's the tentative schedule as posted on their website.


(Gonna be a big day ahead of me. I've always wanted to attend one of these, but something always came up.)

9:00-9:45	Registration and Breakfast
9:50-10:00	Welcome
10:00-10:50	Keynote Theodore Tong, Pharm.D.; Glenn Y. Yokoyama, Pharm.D., FCSHP, FAPhA; Sharon Youmans, Pharm.D., MPH
11:00-11:45	Session A (Choose 1 option)
	Pharmacist Panel Clinical, Academia, Compounding, TBA
	Pharmacy School Information Session University of California, San Diego
	Pharmacy School Information Session University of the Pacific
	Pharmacy School Information Session University of Southern California
11:45-12:30	Session B (Choose 1 option)
	Pharmacy School Information Session Massachusetts College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences
	Pharmacy School Information Session University of Maryland
	Pharmacy School Information Session University of Minnesota
	Pediatric Workshop Lisa Musick, Pharm.D, BCPS
	Dual Degree Workshop Peter Dean, MS
12:30-2:00	Lunch and Student Panel (Choose 1 panel only)
	(12:30pm-1:15pm) - Student Pharmacist Panel 1
	(1:15pm-2:00pm) - Student Pharmacist Panel 2
2:00-2:45	Session C (Choose 1 option)
	Pharmacy School Information Session California Northstate College of Pharmacy
	Pharmacy School Information Session Western University
	Pharmacy School Information Session Touro University
	Home Care Pharmacy Workshop Shannon Reidt, Pharm.D, MPH & Sara Lofstrom, MA
3:00-3:45	Pharmacy School Fair
3:45-4:00	Break
4:00-4:45	Session D (Choose 1 option)
	Pharmacy School Information Session UCSF School of Pharmacy
	PharmCAS Workshop Sara Lofstrom, MA
	Drug Development Workshop Tao Wang, MD, PhD & Henry Leung, Pharm.D
	Disaster Preparedness Workshop Theodore Tong, Pharm.D
4:45-5:00	Closing & Raffle

Some Thoughts

I promised more updates, my schedule has been pretty packed lately but time to put one up.

I've been posting mostly facts (to the best of my ability... but remember to always double check with the school!), but not so much about how I feel.

So let's try that.  Let's talk fears.

I'm currently in my last full semester before applying.  This is pretty much the end of one period of my life, and the beginning of a transition to another.  A period of my life that's taken a looong time to end.  I've talked about how I screwed up in the past, and I don't know if I can show an admissions committee that I have what it takes to handle pharmacy school.

Another big fear I have is that I have no plan on how to pay for pharmacy school if I do get accepted.  Pharmacy school isn't cheap, and costs are only rising.  My credit is not that good, so I don't know how that's going to affect loans.  So I'm afraid that should I actually get accepted, it'll be as if I ran a race and somehow beat the others that no one thought could be beaten... only to trip on my shoe lace right at the finish.  (Or insert the ending to Cool Runnings, a movie about a Jamaican bobsled team.)

Both of these are basic fears of the unknown.  Everyone has those.  But those are the two big ones.

I'm confidant in my abilities, but I think these fears have led to some self sabotage along the way, including my performance last semester.  And that's the one that hurts the most.  If I don't get in, that will be one of the big reasons I think.

Being as analytical as I am, I do have a backup plan at least.  I'm taking all the biotech courses at my community college, which are pretty interesting.  It won't quite be what I was hoping for, but having that backup plan does provide a shield to prevent a total breakdown.

In Serious Need of an Update

Hey look at that. I got a comment.  For some reason I've been meaning to update, but it keeps on getting pushed back.  But it's a good time to take this opportunity and start up again.

I've missed the Summer and Fall without updating.  Here's just a simple summary to get caught up and continue one from here.

In short, I took Cell Biology and General Biochem in the summer, and I think I found a professor to give me a good Letter of Rec in my Cell Biology teacher.  I haven't asked her to write it yet, but I did ask her if she would when I need it (which will be coming up later this year.)  Those two classes were my final two classes at San Francisco State.

Bad news, I did not do well last semester at my community college.  The biggest problem... I seem to have extremely poor sleeping habits.  It's been going on for a while, and it really messed me up.  I was getting 4 to 6 hours a night most nights for no good reason, and I really need at least 7.5 to 8.5 hours to learn and perform optimally.

I feel like an idiot for what happened.  I feel that my chances in getting in a Pharmacy School in California have been seriously hampered.  While I thought I had a chance before, I just don't know anymore.

The PCAT is becoming more and more important for me to take and researching out of state schools.  All hope isn't lost, but I took a wrong turn that is absolutely all my fault.

Expect more regular updates again from here.

P.S. Thanks to California Pharmacy Schools for sparking the return of my updates by commenting on this post.