Francesco Conrado (Medical): I conducted my Medical internship in Athens, Greece, in a top private hospital with cutting-edge technology. It was one of the most impressive organizations I have ever seen in healthcare. My internship role as a medical trainee was to assist doctors during their clinical activities and to observe them during surgery and endoscopy. My favorite memory from my internship experience was the prostate biopsy that the urologist let me perform under his supervision. It was a challenging, important and new experience. I also had the chance to observe one of the best hematologists in Europe at work, they were an amazing supervisor, teaching me a lot! As a medical student, this internship supported my long term goals, as I gained a lot of new clinical and hands-on experience, while also further developing skills I already had. Everything I learned during the hospital internship placement will be useful in my future career as a clinician. It will also help me to complete my medical degree.

Erin Hayes (Engineering): Hi. My name is Erin Hayes, I am twenty two years old, I am from New Jersey, US, and I am currently working my master’s in mechanical airspace in Rutgers University and I am here for four weeks during my Cerca Abroad engineering program. I chose the Cerca Abroad program in Greece because when I was an undergraduate I have studied abroad in Rome and ever since I have wanted to study abroad back in Europe. I was looking for an engineering program abroad because it’s what I have always wanted to be doing for my degree in engineering. So I’ve been for two weeks here so far, and each day I’ve been working on a different project. First week I’ve been working with another intern on 3d mapping and building on campus with a drone, so basically we’ve drawn a bunch of pictures of the building with a drone so that we can use the software to create a 3d map of the building. We used that 3d map for an analysis of the roof of that building to look for different areas of water damage. The second project I’ve been working on has been building a drone. Again with other interns we’ve found the design of the drone and 3d printed the parts before making adjustments to the design and then we worked on wiring with the electronics. So we have basically been working on manufacturing this drone, It has not been completed yet but almost done. So I’ve lived close to the sea in Thessaloniki so I’ve been able to walk in different places, there’s so many things to do. I occasionally found myself going on walks by the water. There’s a pathways that I loved walking on. There’s also a port with a boat that can take you to beaches so I’ve been doing that. Thesaloniki has actually many things to offer and I feel super safe and I’ve met some other interns who are students at the University I’ve been going and have fun and go sightseeing. So, this program to me has been really great all the advisors and directors are super nice and really welcoming. The only thing that I would wish that more women would apply to programs like this. There not so many women, especially in engineering, so it’s been great to work alongside with other women.

Ava McEachern (Dental): I am from Canada and I am winding down on my two week experience here in Athens through Cerca Abroad. So, for the past two weeks I have experienced a variety of different procedures, materials in a different way and just techniques to be good at expanding in four different degrees of cases as well as a variety of outstanding cases and sometimes very jaw dropping cases.
Besides that, my experiences here have been phenomenal, the dentist and the entire staff here have had a lovely sense of humor, they’ve been extremely polite and I was encouraged to pose many questions. And the patients have always been coming in and out with big smiles on their faces and they’ve been very polite and very welcoming.
So, outside of the program, I’ve had the opportunity to experience coffee shops, as well as some breathtaking views from roof tops and sometimes even the other students were also too, so it’s all been a lovely experience. From start to finish you feel extremely welcome, you are well taken care of, it’s very smooth, fluent, and if anybody has any interest at all in the program I would definitely recommend it from start to finish it’s been a phenomenal experience.
I’m hoping to pursue a career in dentistry as well, it’s been my first chance to actually sit for a long period of time to shadow one dentist and it’s been a phenomenal experience. I would recommend it to anybody. If you are a little bit shyer this is definitely a really good place to start. Overall this has really heightened my experience and my ambition to pursue dentistry. And so, again, I would recommend the program to anybody.

Eniola Adeoyelawal (Psychology): My name is Eniola and I am from Houston Texas and I go to college at Colby College in Waterville, Maine. I interned at IASIS in Greece and I choose this internship for many reasons. One reason was to get out of my comfort zone and immerse my self in Greece and to see how the psychological system is done here compared to the States and elsewhere. During my time here I have learned a lot, I learned different units, how they operate, for example the Fabric Republic and how they make cloths and distribute cloths for the community and also how they set up different sites for people to donate it, so its actually more of a community participating to help the community, which is very nice to see. I have really enjoyed my time here, I enjoyed the coordinators as they gave me a nice place to stay, which was very safe and they also gave me a map with tips which I was able to use to explore around, which helped my immersion because I was staying here for one month so having that really helped me get to it right out of the bat. Over all my experience in Athens Greece was amazing, the weather was nice, the people, the culture, the food was all just wonderful. I enjoyed my time here and I do plan on coming back here just here for the visits and just to go back to see all the sights that I wasn’t able to see.