2020-2021 Service Updates

Vocalize Columbus

During the summer of 2020, I co-founded Vocalize Columbus – a nonprofit organization with the mission to improve patient experience and health outcomes for limited English proficiency individuals by connecting interpreters to serve remotely at free clinics in need. It has been a meaningful experience coordinating volunteer operations through hosting workshops, guiding bilingual students towards interpreting certification, and developing a team of professional interpreters from around the world. I am excited to serve as a Spanish medical interpreter on our team.

As we continue to grow our volunteer base, develop our online interface, and meet with community partners, we strive towards our mission. We are looking forward to providing interpretation services at the Remote Area Medical‘s Columbus summer clinic and partnering with the Columbus Cancer Clinic in the fall. As our organization’s Chief Analytics Officer, I am motivated to gain insights and expand our outreach from analyzing data pertaining to the needs of free clinics, patient experience, and interpreter feedback.

Tutoring and Mentoring

Building on my interest to improve access to quality education, I am part of the organizations Pass the Class, UPChieve, and Village Mentors. I mentor and tutor homeless youth, adults working towards their GED, low-income high schoolers, and primary school students in Zambia and Malawi. I appreciate learning from my mentees and it is a fulfilling experience helping them achieve their goals.

Cultivate Columbus

With my Eminence cohort, I helped start an organization called Cultivate Columbus to address social inequities and pursue food justice in low-income neighborhoods through maintaining community gardens. We have been working with Columbus City Schools to create educational materials promoting healthy eating practices, and I initiated a developing partnership with Pass the Class to start a garden at Franklin Manor, one of our community tutoring sites.

La Clínica Latina and Medical Interpretation

Alongside the goals of Vocalize Columbus to overcome the language barrier in medicine and improve health outcomes, I am volunteering with La Clínica Latina, a free healthcare clinic that serves primarily Spanish-speaking patients. I enjoy interpreting for patient intake and organizing our electronic medical record data for clinical reports.

With the goal to provide additional services to caregivers and patients in the clinic, I am training for national certification in medical interpretation. In this pursuit, I completed The Community Interpreter: Medical Focus 40-hour program to develop the foundation for professional interpreting skills.

Safe and Healthy Campus Innovation:

Motivated to contribute to COVID-19 response efforts, I joined a team and pitched a project idea for the Safe and Healthy Campus Innovation Challenge supported by Ohio State’s Chief Wellness Officer, Office of Student Life, and the College of Nursing’s Center for Healthcare Innovation and Wellness. We won the challenge for our interdisciplinary project “Straw-nger Together” on designing and distributing straw-friendly face masks.

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