“It’s like drinking from a fire house.” Before classes even started, I heard that expression a lot and frankly, used it a lot. It’s true.

The first week started off a bit easy. The first day was orientation. That was easy. And we had two classes postponed to the following week. That made that week easy. Of course it meant that much more work last week! By my count we had 16 class lectures, plus a lab and four other scheduled events. It was quite the firehose. I still haven’t caught up on my note taking!

But this week is in some ways where the rubber hits the road.

For one thing, our first “student led lab” was today. In these, we are broken down into three groups, and each group has two student instructors that we rotate through over the next 7-8 weeks. This means everyone at some point will lead a lab. You can guess who, by sheer coincidence get assigned not only to lead a section for the first student lead lab, but the first session of the day. Ayup, myself and a fellow student. So since there are three sections each week, each having two student leaders, that meant that six of us got together on Sunday to setup what are called “presets” on the Anatomage tables and work out our presentations. That took at least six hours. Then on Monday, I spent at least two to three hours doing additional prep and run through. Tuesday, I had to lead my section. I wasn’t quite as well prepared as I would have liked, but I got good feedback, and my fellow students seemed to appreciate my efforts. The TA that graded the section gave me my grade a bit later the same day. 100%. I’m of course happy with that. BUT… that ends up being like just a few percentage of my entire grade. There’s a lot more grades to come.

Speaking of which, Wednesday was one of the bigger tests for another class. It’s big in two ways. For the class it’s in, it represents 20% of the grade for that class! For another, it’s sort of a make or break exam. If you fail it, you actually have a chance to remediate it before the end of the semester. This is great, but if you fail that, you’re dismissed from the program! Reportedly no one, at least in recent memory, has ever failed it twice. So that was reassuring.

The exam itself is “Medical Terminology”. I’ve been studying for it off and on over the past few weeks and 3 of my fellow classmates did a study session for it late Tuesday afternoon. In addition, my Council of Moore has reassured me that I’ll do great given my background (but of course they weren’t the ones actually taking it now, were they?)

So I’ll admit I was not OVERLY nervous but I’d by lying if I didn’t admit that I had been a bit trepidatious about it. Turns out I did “well enough.”

Around here, they reassure us that any grade over an 80% is good enough

Monday morning, I have my next exam. That one honestly, is MUCH harder than the Medical Terminology one, but as long as I pass, I don’t have to worry about being kicked out of the program!

So, wish me luck. I’m confident, but will always take a bit of luck!