{"id":74686,"date":"2013-03-26T08:25:56","date_gmt":"2013-03-26T12:25:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=74686"},"modified":"2023-06-27T13:13:18","modified_gmt":"2023-06-27T17:13:18","slug":"pre-med-student-exploring-range-of-opportunities-at-uconn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2013\/03\/pre-med-student-exploring-range-of-opportunities-at-uconn\/","title":{"rendered":"Pre-med Student Exploring Range of Opportunities at UConn"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Pre-med<\/a>
Pre-med student Shervin Etemad ’14 (CLAS) was inspired by UConn’s Leadership Legacy Experience. (Max Sinton ’15 (CANR)\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Shervin Etemad \u201914 (CLAS) entered UConn with a declared major and has never wavered \u2013 but as graduation approaches, he\u2019s becoming increasingly open-minded about his career path.<\/p>\n

A molecular and cell biology major from the beginning, Etemad wasn\u2019t among the one-third of freshmen who enter UConn without having chosen a major. A Trumbull native, he graduated in the top 4 percent of his high school class, and accepted UConn\u2019s Academic Excellence merit scholarship along with an invitation to join the Honors Program.<\/p>\n

He began his UConn career planning to go directly to medical school upon completing his university studies. In pursuit of that plan, he researched muscle development in Professor David Goldhamer\u2019s lab, and was a volunteer coordinator for the UConn Health Center\u2019s Migrant Worker Clinic. While he values both these experiences, co-curricular activities that unleashed his leadership abilities inspired him to explore other interests as well.<\/p>\n

In 2012, the University recognized Etemad\u2019s leadership potential by inviting him to join UConn\u2019s Leadership Legacy Experience. This year-long program annually brings together about a dozen of UConn\u2019s student leaders to participate in co-curricular activities with alumni, faculty, and staff to enhance the students\u2019 leadership skills.<\/p>\n

Leadership Legacy got Etemad thinking about what he could initiate as a UConn student that would have a lasting impact. He became engaged in expanding the mission and scope of the Honors Program\u2019s Global Leadership Commission, which brings national business and political leaders to campus to interact with students. He is working with a group to create a systematic networking program that bridges class years, so new Honors students connect with upper-class Honors students in the same major.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of students who were leaders at their high schools arrive at UConn looking for a starting point for how to engage here,\u201d Etemad says. \u201cIt\u2019s really cool to help them get the support of upperclassmen, so they can contribute sooner and most effectively.\u201d<\/p>\n

Being a resident assistant in UConn\u2019s Honors Learning Community gives Etemad the opportunity to help connect younger honors students with older honors students. \u201cEverything ties together on some level,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Next year Etemad will work with UConn\u2019s Department of Residential Life and the Connecticut Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation to launch a new learning community, to be known as Innovation House.<\/p>\n

With a year left before graduation, Etemad says he\u2019s doing \u201cquite the opposite\u201d of firming up his career plans. \u201cI\u2019m actively defining my other areas of interest,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m not locked in to what I\u2019d planned in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

Etemad, who has a minor in Spanish, said he decided to add another minor, in women\u2019s, gender, and sexuality studies, \u201ca field that\u2019s a breath of fresh air,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s nice balancing out a heavy science course load with humanities classes. I\u2019ve found other academic areas that interest me. I\u2019m quickly realizing how short my time here at UConn is, and I want to make the most of it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shervin Etemad ’14 (CLAS) set out as a pre-med student and has stuck to his plans, but he has also taken opportunities to explore diverse interests.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":74244,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,2234],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[117],"class_list":["post-74686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","category-university-life"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-23 03:40:50","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74686"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74686\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":74709,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74686\/revisions\/74709"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/74244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74686"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=74686"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=74686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}