ERWIN ZHU

During the spring/summer of 2024, I did research under Dr. Juan Ianowski (PhD) on Cystic Fibrosis at the university of Saskatchewan. For my research I was funded through the Biomedical Summer Research grant by the Office of Vice-Dean Research, College of Medicine. During my time as a researcher, I gained skills in:

• Communication with colleagues and fellow lab members regarding data collection, experimentation quality control, etc. during lab meetings/discussions
• Developing research propositions, experiments, building a hypothesis
• Reading and understanding peer-reviewed articles, papers, the abstracts and hypotheses proposed by researchers, and the methods performed
• Data collection, performing experiments in biomedical research
• Organizing data and information into reports to present to group members during meetings
• Utilization of data analysis software and Microsoft Excel

As an emergency navigator, I had the responsibility to meet with patients and families at the front of the emergency department to direct them to appropriate administration. The following were other responsibilities I took on as a navigator:

• Engaged with patients in conversation
• Assisted patients with information and comfort in the waiting area of the emergency department
• Answered general questions posed by patients and families while waiting in the emergency waiting room
• The care and navigation of patients to appropriate areas (other sections of the emergency department and areas outside of the emergency department) under stressful and busy conditions
• Communication with different levels of administration at the front of the emergency department (registration, triage nurses, security)

The Saskatoon Open Door Society is a local organization which strives to help newcomers get settled into their new life in Canada. The conversations circle is one of the programs offered by Open Door which aids newcomers improve English comprehension and proficiency through way of conversation with participants and volunteers. As a conversations circle leader, I was tasked to:

• Guide participants through an English reading worksheet while making way for conversation during our learning
• Ensure participants were logged on attendance
• Navigating discussion and conversation between participants and other conversations circle leaders
• Act as an interpreter for participants with Mandarin as a native language

Learning communities offered by the College of Arts and Science are a program in which students in their 3rd and 4th year have an opportunity to become a mentor for new students at USask. As a peer mentor, my responsibilities were to:

• Facilitated learning communities that provided a supportive learning environment for new students
• Spend an hour a week to coordinate learning community sessions with the goal of getting new students more integrated to the campus, introducing students to services available to them, etc.
• Attend weekly peer mentorship trainings
• Navigate and promote meaningful discussions as a leader through sharing my own experiences as a student at USask
• Follow-up with students on questions they may have after every session and refer them to the available campus resources that they may benefit from

As a volunteer mentor for the Biochemistry, Microbiology, Immunology Student's Association (BMISA) peer mentorship program, I was paired with a first-year student interested in pursuing a similar degree as I was. The program consisted of monthly meetings involving:

• Keeping updated with my peer's stress levels, concerns regarding exams and course content
• Referring the student to appropriate resources available to them (e.g. academic advising, course catalogues)
• Sending follow-up emails regarding questions and concerns addressed in each meeting
• Communicating and organizing a meeting with the student every month throughout the academic year