Two occupational therapy students in Tuskegee University’s School of Nursing and Allied Health recently were selected as participants in the Alabama Schweitzer Fellowship — a competitive statewide program for graduate students to address the unmet health needs of vulnerable populations.
As 2017-18 ASF Fellows, Jasmine Grayson and Micah Thomas will be among the 16 graduate students who will spend the next year learning to effectively address the social factors that impact health, as well as developing lifelong leadership skills — thereby following the example set by famed physician and humanitarian, Albert Schweitzer, for whom the fellowship is named.
As part of their fellowship experience, Grayson and Thomas will execute a project that encourages healthy behaviors and promotes health education among children in Macon County through the organization Tuskegee Youth Safe Haven. Their project will address health education, physical activity and gardening for underprivileged and low socioeconomic-status children. These activities are intended to capture and maintain the children’s attention while also providing them with an opportunity to lead healthy lifestyles. Overall, the program will promote physical activities, healthy food choices, and proper gardening techniques with the goal of establishing sustainable health behaviors for the rest of the children’s lives. The children will develop positive relationships with role models and congenial relationships with peers in attempts to build a closer-knit community.
Dr. Jannett Lewis-Clark, interim director of Tuskegee’s Occupational Therapy Program, serves as the students’ academic mentor for their community service project.
“The Department of Allied Health is very proud of Jasmine and Micah for being selected as ASF Fellows, said Lewis-Clark, who also serves as an assistant professor and head of the Department of Allied Health. “Our students are among not just the 16 Alabama Schweitzer fellows, but are joining approximately 240 other U.S. Schweitzer Fellows working at program sites around the United States.”
The Alabama Schweitzer program is housed in the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Medicine. Upon completion of the fellowship year, Grayson, Thomas and other Alabama Schweitzer Fellows will be recognized as Schweitzer Fellows for life and join a vibrant network of more than 3,400 Schweitzer alumni who are skilled in, and committed to, addressing the health needs of underserved people throughout their careers.
In 2016, two Tuskegee University occupational therapy students were among the inaugural class of Alabama Schweitzer Fellows. For more information, visit
http://www.schweitzerfellowship.org/chapters/alabama.
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