Posts Tagged ‘Kelly Hawk’

On Saturday, June 11, Joe and I attended the Doctoral Convocation Hooding and Awards Ceremony for The Ohio State University’s College of Pharmacy in Mershon Auditorium. We had four students who were graduating and receiving their pharmacy degrees, including our own Kelly, who has worked at Plain City Druggist since 2005.

Besides Kelly, we also had three students, Anna Gehres, Matt Byrdy, and Jimmy Byun, do rotations in the store this past year and they also received their PharmD degrees.

Matt and Kelly had asked Joe to place their hoods on them, officially making them Doctors of Pharmacy. This is a very big honor and Joe was a bit nervous about performing the task–especially for Matt, who is much taller than Joe. Even standing on a wooden box, Joe had a hard time getting Matt’s hood over his head and the whole audience was laughing by the time they were done. Kelly’s was a bit easier to do, since Joe didn’t have to reach so high!

Anna Gehres received the Stephen W. Birdwell Student Award, which is given to a student by the student class for their participation, interaction with class mates, professionalism, and general outgoing nature–Andy Hall, our former student, received the award last year. This award is given in honor of a former professor in the College of Pharmacy who died several years ago. Dr. Birdwell was well loved and very respected by the students and faculty in the pharmacy department. This award honors his spirit in a current graduating student–someone whose peers select them as also being well loved and respected, who will make a wonderful pharmacist, not only because of their brain power, but because of their ability to care and have compassion. That was Andy and that is definitely Anna.

Anna also received the Anne L. Burns Award (Anne Burns was the compounding instructor while Joe and I were in school and we learned all we know about compounding from her–she was a super teacher) and the College of Pharmacy Professionalism Award. Anna will be doing a year long residency at Nationwide Children’s Hospital.

Matt also will be in a residency for the next year at Mount Carmel West in Columbus, while Kelly is off to St. Louis to work for Walgreen’s as a floater pharmacist (meaning she will go to whichever store she is needed in).

Jimmy, as class president, had to give the “Response from the Class of 2011.” Not surprisingly, he did a nice job with his speech, even though he was very nervous and stalled so long at the beginning, we thought he was not going to do it.

An even greater surprise was the arrival at the very end of the ceremony by Dr. Gordon Gee. He came in flanked by security and since Joe and I were standing in the back of the room, we immediately saw his arrival. He sat down in a back row of seats out of the way and then greeted each of the pharmacy students as they left. Joe wanted to get a photo, but we weren’t allowed over by him. Joe did get a faraway photo of Anna and Dr. Gee. You can see that on our Facebook page.

Finally, we had a really nice dinner with Kelly, her parents, her brother, sister-in-law, and niece. We are really going to miss Kelly. She had a rough final year of pharmacy school, but we know the future is only going to bring her lots of happiness and opportunities.

Good luck and congratulations to Kelly, Anna, Matt, and Jimmy. We are very proud to have played a small part in your education and your journey to become Doctors of Pharmacy.

To see all the photos from the hooding ceremony, visit our Facebook page HERE.

Our pharmacy student, Kelly Hawk, will be graduating from The Ohio State University’s College of Pharmacy this Saturday, June 11, in a special hooding ceremony. While Joe and I both received a five year, Bachelor of Science degree in Pharmacy, Kelly’s program involved getting an undergraduate Bachelor degree and then going on to get another four year pharmacy professional degree. Kelly will graduate with a PharmD, which is the equivalent of a PhD. After Saturday, you can call her Dr. Kelly Hawk.

We are so proud of Kelly.

Kelly came to work for us in May 2005. She had graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in computer science and couldn’t find a job. So she decided to find out more about pharmacy, take pre-requisite classes for pharmacy school, and then go on to become a pharmacist.

When Kelly first started at the drugstore, she was our clerk and delivery driver. She rang the register, got lost trying to deliver medications, and did just about anything she had to do to learn what pharmacy was all about. From clerk and delivery driver, she progressed to pharmacy technician and took the exam to be a licensed tech. Licensing for technicians wasn’t required at that time (it now is), but Kelly went above and beyond to show she was dedicated to the profession. All the time she was working, Kelly was also taking chemistry courses and other classes she needed before applying to pharmacy school.

In 2007, Kelly’s hard work paid off and she was admitted to The Ohio State University’s College of Pharmacy. For the past four years, Kelly has been going to school full time and working for us on Saturdays and during her breaks. All that “blood, sweat, and tears” is finally coming to an end and she will be a graduate this weekend and will take her pharmacy licensing exam in the coming weeks to make her a registered pharmacist (RPh).

Please stop in the pharmacy this week (Kelly will be here Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday) and tell Kelly congratulations.

Besides Kelly, three of our other pharmacy students will also be graduating on Saturday: Matt Byrdy, Anna Gehres, and Jimmy Byun. You have met all of them during their rotations through the drugstore. We wish them all much luck as they go forward as pharmacists.

Matt and Kelly are also honoring Joe by having him place their hoods on them in the hooding ceremony on Saturday. This is a very distinguished honor to ask Joe to lead them forward into the profession of pharmacy. Joe has been a mentor to Kelly and Matt (as well as our other students) and he is so excited to be doing this for them (although he may need a step stool to place Matt’s hood on him, since he towers over Joe). Don’t worry, we’ll have plenty of photos from this celebration on Saturday!

We also want to congratulate all of the area graduates, including our own Michaela Henderson, who is leaving St. John’s Lutheran School behind as she graduates from the eighth grade. Since St. John’s only has a program for students from kindergarten to eighth grade, Michaela will be attending Fairbanks next year as she begins high school. Michaela was selected as the salutatorian of her class and made a speech this past week. We know that this is only the beginning of lots of great things academically and on the basketball court for this beautiful, young lady. Perhaps, there is another pharmacy student tagging along on Kelly’s heels?

On May 18, Joe and I attended a dessert reception at The Ohio State University College of Pharmacy for the Partner for Promotion program. Plain City Druggist is involved in the Partner for Promotion program. Joe acts as a preceptor for the pharmacy students who work on advanced patient care service projects during their final year in pharmacy school. The students who choose to participate in this program are real go-getters, as they don’t receive any extra credit for doing this. They do, however, learn a lot for their futures as pharmacists. They also really have to be able to manage their time well. The projects usually establish programs in community pharmacies that can continue to work after the students are no longer there. These programs include diabetes clinics, OTC counseling programs, cholesterol monitoring, and other important health services that patients need.

Our pharmacy student and soon-to-be pharmacist, Kelly Hawk, did a Partner for Promotion project as a fourth year pharmacy student this past year at Schieber Family Pharmacy in Circleville, Ohio. Working with owner and pharmacist, Larry Schieber, and pharmacist, Karlyn Neff, Kelly’s project was called “Prescription to Quit” and provided tobacco/smoking cessation counseling and education to smokers who wanted to end their habit.

Kelly (on the end at the right) with other Partner for Promotion students.

Kelly not only set up the program, but she also began a collaboration with Berger Health System in the Circleville area to create a new class series called Stay Quit Tobacco Treatment Program. With this collaboration, Schieber’s will be able to provide medication counseling for patients trying to quit and then recommend them to the Berger classes for behavioral counseling. Studies have shown that for people to successfully quit smoking, they need changes in behavior along with medications to help them stop. Kelly will actually be teaching a class in this series on June 1.

We are so proud of Kelly, who will be graduating from the College of Pharmacy next month. She is going to be a wonderful pharmacist and we are proud that we had something to do with that!

Kelly with Pharmacist Larry Schieber of Schieber Family Pharmacy in Circleville, Ohio.