We’re proud at WSE to be regular hosts to students of many levels. Every year we assist Year 10 work experience students wondering whether optometry or dispensing careers would suit, Year 12 students getting serious about their University applications and optometry students already studying at University.
This week we’ve been hosting a final year student, or Intern, from the University of Melbourne. This is his SEVENTH year at University, having followed the Melbourne Uni model of a three year undergraduate degree before applying for the four year Doctorate of Optometry. The coursework and lectures are finished, with this entire last year of study dedicated to clinical experience.
We’re so impressed with the new class of optometrist being produced – our Intern visitor is interested, attentive and absolutely paying attention to every little of details of our testing procedures, patient communication and eyecare management. He has a firm grasp of the information and, with a whole year of supervised clinical work still to go, is already considering how to best apply his knowledge to the care of every patient’s needs.
It’s a long time since Mark and I were at Uni. We like to think our clinical training was second to none (“Back in the good old days…” and all that), but in truth it was our early employers and our own dogged determination that shaped the optometrists we became.
Supervising the new breed of students is a marvellous challenge to us, to rethink our everyday testing procedures, to refresh our knowledge, and in some cases to justify our clinical choices. It’s ‘back to the books’ to make sure we’re referencing the latest research with a healthy overlay of common sense and experience in interpreting and applying the recommendations to real life clinical situations.
We’re here in our capacity as teachers to share our knowledge. Yet somehow, as they say, the teachers again become the students…
Kirily Bowen, July 2015