Learning from experience
Hailey Stack鈥檚 summer was not the one she expected but one that may have changed her course for her studies and future career plans.
The second-year Science student worked at Halifax鈥檚 Northwood Manor, which became a central location for COVID-19 cases and fatalities in Nova Scotia.
鈥淚 worked at Northwood as a dietary aide, feeding residents, helping to prepare food and the dining area,鈥 she says. 鈥淚 was at the home over the course of the spring, where pandemic measures were steadily being increased. We were working in full PPE gear.鈥
Stack, who is from Halifax, worked in the Manor throughout the spring before moving to a different nursing home where she was a support aide.
While she has always looked at a career in health care, Stack says her experiences in the nursing homes help give her a broader perspective for the field.
鈥淚鈥檝e always wanted to go to medical school, and I love working with people. I鈥檝e worked with kids in the past at camps but wanted to get some experience working with seniors as well,鈥 says Stack. 鈥淭his summer gave me that opportunity, assisting residents with different tasks, some of whom couldn鈥檛 see their families for months due to the pandemic.鈥
Stack is back in Sackville this year, studying Science both online and on campus. She鈥檚 also taking the religious studies course, Death and the Afterlife in Asian religions.
鈥淭his class is really opening my eyes to other disciplines. I鈥檓 learning a lot about things I鈥檝e never thought of before around death and the afterlife and our perceptions around these,鈥 says Stack.
Outside her studies and work, Stack is also a member of the women鈥檚 varsity team and a volunteer with Right to Play, MtA Healthcare Outreach, and the Cumberland Regional Healthcare Centre in Amherst, NS.
While the COVID-19 pandemic has put some of these activities on hold, Stack says she is glad to be back on campus to see her teammates and professors, even if it鈥檚 virtually.
鈥淚 had originally been looking at schools in Ontario and Quebec but when I came for a campus visit, I fell in love with the atmosphere. Being able to study science and play at a school that was close to home, but not too close, Mount A鈥檚 been a perfect fit for me,鈥 she says.
