2016 Alia Rose Devasahayam

Mentor Company - Spinal Cord Injury Research

What Do You Want To Be? - An essay on a career adventure

If you asked an average group of grade eight girls what they wanted to be when they grew up, I can guarantee you that at least half of them don’t really know. Most of them have a general idea of course, a lawyer, a veterinarian, or perhaps a teacher. But they haven’t fallen in love with anything particular yet, mostly because they don’t know what kinds of jobs are out there, what you can train to be, what the world will offer. It’s not anyone’s fault really, they just aren’t exposed to that sort of thing. That’s why I think Operation Minerva is such a great opportunity for young girls to really get out there, maybe for the first time.

My career to be explored was Spinal Cord Injury Research with my mentor, Nicole McKenzie, and the other student, Sarah. Sarah knew exactly what she wanted to be: an oncologist. Following my look of utter confusion, she hastily explained that an oncologist was a cancer doctor, which I had never heard of before that day. I had already learned something that I never would have known!

Shortly after we entered Nicole’s office, she claimed that her job as a spinal researcher wasn’t interesting enough, and that we would be spending our day with many women of science. How exciting was that, to meet strong women with scientific careers! Little did we know the sheer extent Nicole had gone through to plan our day.

First up, we went to visit Dr. Patten in the cardiology section of the hospital. “I’m not exactly a woman of science,” he joked in his quiet manner. While we were there, a patient was in the MRI machine getting, well, scanned. Dr. Patten showed us live images of the patient’s heart, and we brainstormed together to see what was wrong with it while his co-workers were operating the MRI. As he was showing us the images, he listed off the many jobs involved in that one MRI. The manufacturer's, operator, and technicians were the obvious ones, but there was also 3D computer modellers, software creators, and researchers, just to name a few. I thought this was our absolute coolest stop, but there was more yet to come.

Our next stop was with two ladies in two kinds of therapy. One was Occupational Therapy, and the other was Physical Therapy, though they were both pretty similar. The job of an Occupational Therapist is to help the patient gain small movement back after a spinal injury or stroke, such as to sit up in bed. Then, when they are able to do that (or when the Occupational Therapist deems them worthy) they get transported down to the gym, with various machines or tools designed to increase their mobility. Sonya told us that there was a whole set of staff in the hospital just for the express purpose of the transportation of the patients. Now there’s another career I had no idea about. In the words of Sonya and Mary “Our job is to help them become as independent as they can be.”

I found the career of a these ladies to be very sad, especially because one man’s family was there, watching him and cheering him on to do up some buttons. It just goes to show how you can be completely independent one day, and can’t go to the bathroom the next. It is sad, but very necessary; without those physical and occupational therapists, lots of people would never have regained their mobility. For the first time today, I had found a career I was not compatible with, because of all the people suffering. I don’t think that I could ever handle it, as it would be too emotionally strenuous for me.

At about 11:30, Nicole led us to a cute little conference room tucked away on another floor in her building. (Her building was converted from an old nurse residency, to lots of offices) Other ladies she knew met us there to tell us about their careers, and how they got there. Surprisingly enough, only one of them ended up being what they thought would be upon entering university.

Magda thought she was going to be a pediatrician, and then went to school to be an occupational therapist. She did that for a while and then was asked to be a part of this other job. There, she listens to doctor and patient liaisons, and then she applies for government funding, with the evidence she collects. For example, she would say “We need this amount of money, because the patients aren’t getting the care they need.” She is essentially the person who asks the government for grants, which is a whole job in itself.

There was also two other ladies who created a new niche for themselves. These ladies had both successfully recovered from strokes. Wanting to help others like them, they created a support group for people who are recovering from strokes, and later spinal cord injuries. Their job was to help them through their strokes, kind of say, “There can be a light at the end of the tunnel.” As of now, they are working on creating a support group for family members of stroke patients.

After lunch, we went to a room just past the cardiology department, where a study was being held. They got funding for a super sensitive robot that measures movement to study the movement in people, specifically people with strokes versus without. They had olympic athletes get tested with it, and stroke patients alike, all within a wide spectrum of ages in order get a variety of results. Both Sarah and I got to try it out, which was so cool!

You sat in this chair, and a lady sized it for you while fastening your arms to it’s arms. Basically, it was an exoskeleton of your arms. Once it was calibrated, they wheeled you in front of a screen, which had different types of “games” designed to measure the speed and accuracy of your reflexes on both sides of your body. Funnily enough, it reminded me of a very simple version of Mario!

Our last stop for the day was in the workshop of a man named PJ. In his workshop, there are all kinds of wheelchair parts imaginable. That’s because he is in charge of all of the wheelchairs in the whole hospital! When he was a teenager, he hung around the hospital a lot, because his mother was sick. It wasn’t long before they found out about his mechanically savvy aptitude and hired him for a job there. Eventually, he got to be in charge of the whole thing.

With his assistant, Justine, we played around on the wheelchairs while PJ told us about the different parts, why they were used, and when. After that, he showed us how to raise the height of a wheelchair, and then told us to do it. “I believe every girl should know how to use tools.” he said. Too soon after, we said our goodbyes, and the bus came to pick us up.

That day I learned of many careers I would be interested in, but also some that were not for me. Both are equally important in choosing a career, and I am grateful to have such an opportunity, especially when most kids have to figure it out for themselves. I think that if every kid was afforded with such a great opportunity as this, we would be so much more aware of the options, and so much better for it. I think you would find, that half of them really do know what they want to be when they grow up.

Thank you so much to all the people who make Operation Minerva as great as it is, such as my mentor, Nicole McKenzie, the bus drivers, the co-ordinator Jo-Anne Pentelichuk, and all of the wonderful teachers who support this, including my own, Mrs. Paslawski. It was such a great day, and I’ll never forget how much I learned!