MSU Denver: Designing Your Future Health Career
Applying the Designing Your Life framework to exploring a career in healthcare with Latine identifying Health Scholars at MSU Denver.
What is a Health Scholar Program?
Health Scholars programs in the Gina and Frank Day Health Institute at Metropolitan State University of Denver were designed and implemented to empower diverse, post-secondary healthcare students in navigating their academic and career pathways using the “Designing Your Life” (DYL) framework. Students who go through the program are deemed "Health Scholars.” These programs were created in response to the increasing need for a more diverse healthcare workforce as described in the 2022 Colorado Workforce Development Council report, and to address the inequity and barriers in higher education that many of our scholars face when accessing these specific careers. Health Scholar programs aim to address these barriers and workforce demand by applying the DYL framework along with intentional mentoring, advising, and other high-impact practices to support health scholars in attaining their academic and healthcare career goals. Each Health Scholar program includes a combination of:
Workshops in Life Design
Health equity and community-building workshops/courses,
One-on-one mentoring with peer and professional mentors, and
Access to a health career navigator (HCN) who provides individualized, ongoing wraparound services including DYL coaching
Where are Health Scholars Programs Housed?
Metropolitan State University of Denver (MSU Denver) is an urban, Hispanic-Serving Institution that was proudly awarded the Seal of Excelencia in 2022 for its commitment to intentionally serving Latine students. This open-access institution boasts a diverse student body with 55.2% of students identifying as people of color; 59.7% are first-generation college students and 33% are eligible for the Pell grant (low-income status). MSU Denver’s Gina and Frank Day Health Institute at MSU Denver is housed in the College of Health and Human Sciences and supports students in 10 healthcare-related departments, serving nearly one-third of all MSU Denver students.
Who is a Health Scholar?
Health Scholar programs recruit and support students from backgrounds that are underrepresented in healthcare fields (BIPOC, first-generation college, low-income, non- traditional age, veteran, LGBTQIA+ and/or DACA/undocumented status) to address the diverse workforce needs identified by the healthcare industry. The American Hospital Association (2021) predicted that the U.S. will face a shortage of up to 3.2 million health workers by 2026, including allied health and behavioral health professionals. Just as importantly, there is a need for a more diverse healthcare workforce. Patients often report greater satisfaction with their physician when the patient and the provider share the same race (LaVeist & Nuru-Jeter, 2002). Meeting the needs of an increasingly diverse population in Colorado necessitates the education and graduation of healthcare students from diverse backgrounds.
Why Create a Latine Identifying Health Scholar Cohort?
Significant equity gaps persist for first-generation and BIPOC students in higher education. Compared to their continuing-generation peers, first-generation and BIPOC students often report a lower sense of belonging in college and a lack of connections with faculty and career professionals (i.e., social capital), and these factors impact attrition rates and career outcomes (Allan et al., 2016; Gummadam et al., 2016; Patton et al., 2016). In 2021, “about a quarter of Latinos ages 25 to 29 (23%) had earned a bachelor’s degree while 45% of White Americans and 72% of Asian Americans ages 25 to 29 had done so.” (Mora, 2022). According to the 2020 Colorado census, 21% of Colorado residents identify as Hispanic or Latino demonstrating a need for a representative healthcare workforce to meet their needs. To ensure more Latine students enter and matriculate from healthcare programs, the Bank of America Health Scholars program for Latine healthcare students was developed and implemented in 2022. It is important to clarify that when we use the term “Latine,” we are referring to students who self-identify as Latino/a/e/x, Chicano/a, and Hispanic. Latine, a newer and gender-neutral term for people with Latin American heritage, is used for simplicity and inclusivity purposes.
Unique features of the Bank of America Health Scholars Program (BOAHS)
After receiving funding via a 2-year grant from the Bank of America’s Progresando Initiative, the Bank of America Health Scholars Program was created to specifically identify and recruit cohorts of: • twenty-five Latine-identifying healthcare students, • four Latine-identifying undergraduate peer fellows, and • one Latine-identifying graduate fellow. The program’s staff coordinator, or the “health career navigator” (HCN), was also identified as Latine, creating a 100% Latine staff and student community for the program. These interdisciplinary cohorts collaborated to support each other in navigating their academic pathways and to think through how they might address issues of inequitable access to high quality healthcare for the Latine community specifically in their future roles as Latine healthcare providers.
During eight, three-hour workshops, students engaged in the design thinking process and applied DYL tools along the way. We intentionally spent extra time in the empathy phase of design thinking process to complete exercises and reflections around the Latine identity and what that means in relationship to being a person in the USA, a university student, a healthcare student, and a healthcare professional. This empathy work, along with collaboratively created group norms, enabled us to create a safe, brave container for the DYL work to take place. Translating DYL materials into Spanish also allowed some of our students to engage with the work more deeply, adding another layer of safety to the space. In this container, students learned how to define well-framed problems, how to ideate innovative solutions to prototype and test, and built a community of like-minded peers alongside mentors and guest speakers with shared identities and backgrounds that added valuable social capital to our students’ banks. Informational interviews, prototyping, odyssey plans, authentic introductions and the cycle of non-regret were just some of the DYL elements included in our seminars that resonated with our students.
Impact on Students
Two years of data show that the program had an overall positive impact on students on many levels. Some metrics to highlight from our final evaluation survey of students include:
“I feel very grateful to be a part of the Bank of America Health Scholars because it has shown me what the world could be and look like if we all full-heartedly pursued our goals and dreams. This program has done an AMAZING job of not only providing a space for individuals who may not have thought they would be at a university level but also providing encouragement and mentorship to help guide us along our journey to making a difference. The strategies, skills, and concepts I have learned in this program have had a huge impact on how I approach my education, life surprises, and the world around me.”
-Student from cohort one
Hopes for the Future...
After a successful two years of implementing the Bank of America Latine Health Scholars Program in the Gina and Frank Day Health Institute at MSU Denver, our grant funding cycle has finished, and we look to the future of life design and Health Scholars programs. We are currently implementing similar programming for a cohort of DACA/Undocumented students and another focused on addressing issues of equity in Black healthcare. We are also expanding beyond the traditional four-year university setting with recently implemented cohorts at two community colleges and are exploring moving our work into the high school space. All programs include the essential life design tools and the implementation of the Designing Your Life framework to support our diverse students in navigating their academic and career pathways. We hope to make a positive impact on students and the healthcare workforce in Colorado for years to come.