Bright Young Minds

Forty-eight high school students sit in a classroom, quietly listening to a lecture. They look like any other group of high schoolers - some watching intently, some looking down at their hands, some fidgeting a little in the hard blue seats trying to get comfortable.

The first indication that you get that these are not run-of-the-mill high school students is when the lecturer starts asking questions - hard questions. Questions to which you personally don't remember ever knowing the answers. Sure, the kids respond like any typical high school kids... hesitantly holding up a hand while looking around to see if someone else is going to volunteer to answer. But then they answer... and you are amazed at the precision and accuracy of their answers. How on earth did they know that? you wonder.

I shouldn't be surprised at how bright these youngsters are, these invitees to the Midwestern University Health Careers Institute for High School Students. After all, I helped go through the applications they sent in from as far away as Kingman, Arizona, so I know just how accomplished they are in their schoolwork.

In some ways, they are no different than any other student you might see. They have all of the typical teenage hang-ups about volunteering and being put on the spot, and sometimes they speak very softly when they answer, worried that they may not be right and that they might get laughed at for being wrong.

But then you put them in a hands-on learning situation - analyzing a classmate's gait in the OMM lab to look for potential bone or muscular anomalies, suturing pigs' feet, or examining a partner's eye under a microscope. Then... oh my, look at how their eyes light up. The hunger to learn escapes the confines of their social filters, most often expressed verbally as, "Oh my gosh, this is so cool."

I recently turned 40, so it's been a long time since I was in these kids' shoes (and I doubt I was ever as bright as they are). But observing them in the HCI classes, I felt myself transported back to when I was their age. I recalled the thrill of discovery, the joy of learning with the faculties of a young mind, the amazement and excitement when the mental tumblers clicked into place and a difficult concept suddenly made sense.

And yes, I feel envious of them. But I also feel that excitement and wonder by proxy and am thrilled about the possibilities of where those feelings might take them in their lives. At the level of achievement where these students currently are, they have the potential to do virtually anything they set their minds to.

Hence, the value of the Health Careers Institute - by giving these bright young minds a hands-on taste of the application of all of the theories and principles they previously have learned in books, we stoke their appetite to pursue these disciplines as a career. And do we not wish to see the brightest minds in these critical vocations? In years to come, when you visit your own doctor, would it not be comforting to know that behind the years of experience and study was a young student who is continually excited about the possibilities of modern medicine?

Of the many events I have participated in since I began working at Midwestern University, this one has to rank as one of my favorites. I hope that the students found the HCI as memorable as I have.