LIFE@OSU » mentors

Taking on new challenges

theresa.hogue@oregonstate.edu — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 15:37:27 +0000

For the most part, an adviser’s central task is to ensure that a student meets all the necessary requirements in order to graduate. But, for Louie Bottaro, advising means much more.

Advisor Louie Bottaro thinks mentoring is not just about graduation requirements, but how to get students where they want to go. Student Neha George realized that meant switching majors. (photo: Jim Folts)

“I want to talk about your life and help you figure out how to get to where you want to go,” he says.

For Neha George, getting there meant making a major switch from biochemistry and biophysics to political science. George felt that by migrating to the College of Liberal Arts, she would be challenging herself.

After taking an international relations course, George discovered a new perspective through which she could view the globe and learned, in part, “what it means to be a citizen of the world,” she says.

“Making the move to the College of Liberal Arts has been a humbling experience.” George says. “Not only did it get me out of labs, but I’ve found that political science helps you to realize that the world doesn’t revolve around you.”

Especially motivated by the status of women in varying regions around the globe, George has found a position that not only matches her course of study but also her central interests within political science by working at the Women’s Center on campus as an outreach and activism coordinator.

Bottaro has also challenged her, providing advice on potential internships and, as graduation approached, her job search.

“I definitely seek his opinion on what I can excel in or what not might be a good fit for me,” George says. “I value his ability to not just relate, but his willingness to speak his mind.”

~ Tara Pistorese

Lessons in balance motivate student

theresa.hogue@oregonstate.edu — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 08:15:41 +0000

How does pre-med student Nicolette O’Donnell manage school, obligations to the Kappa Delta sorority and the University Honors College, plus elite dance team practice?
“I have a color-coded planner,” she jokes. “I am content with my life. I know that I do the best I can.”
With the support of family, friends and her adviser, Kevin Ahern, O’Donnell feels that she has learned essential lessons in balance.
“Kevin has always told me not to overload myself,” O’Donnell says. “He motivates me to understand what the next steps are and how to build essential relationships.”
Ahern and O’Donnell like to say she is abolishing the science-nerd stereotype. “I am proud to be a science student but that is not my label,” O’Donnell says. “I am myself.”
Demonstrating her varying areas of interest, O’Donnell chose the emotional development in poetry as her senior thesis topic for the University Honors College.
“I have a passion for poetry,” O’Donnell says. “Why not pursue that as well?”
O’Donnell gives credit to Ahern for helping to guide her through what have been “very good years” at OSU.
“He always asks how I am doing and I know that he really is interested in what is going on,” O’Donnell says. “He genuinely cares about students.”
O’Donnell hopes to pursue a career in dermatology and Ahern has no doubt that medical school is in her near future.
“Learning at what level you can operate and still do your best is something that takes a while but is essential to learn,” Ahern says.
“I would point to Nicolette as someone who has managed that without question.”
~ by Tara Pistorese

Mentor jumps beyond theory to a mom and her two kids

theresa.hogue@oregonstate.edu — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 08:10:16 +0000

Elizabeth Cuno gained real life skills from her mentor, Stephanie Bernell, College of Health and Human Sciences. (photo: Jim Folts)

Elizabeth Cuno has two excellent reasons for majoring in health management and policy: her kids.

Seven years ago, Cuno experienced complications 20 weeks into her pregnancy and had no insurance. At first, the hospital “just told me my daughter was going to die,” she says, “and I don’t think the hospital treated me as though I were a person.”

Although Cuno and her baby eventually received the necessary care, she decided she wanted others to receive better treatment than she experienced.

Last spring, Cuno took Stephanie Bernell’s class in health economics in the College of Health and Human Sciences. It’s a difficult class where students have to learn complex mathematical tools to analyze the healthcare system.

Cuno says she appreciates Bernell’s passion for the topic, her ability to look at it from several angles and how she goes beyond theories by giving students newspaper and peer-reviewed articles that coincided with the lecture topics.

Bernell also provides students with examples of how a theory is applied in a person’s life, like how to buy health insurance — something many students don’t have. In some cases, Bernell has gone with her students to examine their options and fill out the forms.

In class, she’ll download an insurance contract and show students how to read it, explaining deductibles, copayments, expenditure caps, formulary restrictions and other issues students can expect to confront over their lifetimes.

“I don’t just tell them what the concept is, I actually bring it to class,” Bernell says. “It’s not abstract anymore.”

Bernell finds inspiration from students like Cuno, who balances school, working an average of 30 hours a week and raising two kids on her own. “Elizabeth tries harder than almost any student I know,” Bernell says. “That she manages the other commitments in her life and takes school as seriously as she does is remarkable.”

Bernell also believes OSU serves an important purpose in making education accessible for students who have to work around real-life constraints.

“Oregon State is a great place because we can give students like Elizabeth really top educational opportunities at an affordable price. Set the bar high enough and students will reach it. Elizabeth is a student who does that.”

~ by Gary Dulude