Gene Denton 10

My name is Cinaya Gillespy and I am a Senior in highschool who is currently enrolled with JCCC (Johnson County Community College) and KCKCC (Kansas City Kansas Community College). Within my school, we have career based projects that we are doing and mine is Dental Hygiene. I go to the internship on Mondays from 1:30 to 3:30 and 1:30 to 3:00 on Wednesdays. After doing my internship for quite some time, my mom and a doctor she works with recommended me to look at careers involving ultrasound. I had started to lose interest in the Dental Hygiene field after seeing it up close and learning more about it, so I decided to listen to their suggestions and do some research. 

After diving into some research, I found some interesting careers like rad tech (Radiologic Technologist) and ultrasound tech (pregnancy wise). A Rad Tech is someone who puts patients into positioning for x rays and takes them for the doctor to diagnose while a Ultrasound Tech for babies more or less looks at the baby live through the monitor. Being an Ultrasound Tech that dealt with babies was not for me, it would make me too sad to know that the babies didn’t make it and the couple being happy and excited about seeing said baby. As for Rad Tech, I had to consider things like “will this make me happy?” and “would I enjoy this career?” I wasn’t able to say yes because I know what I’m good at and what I’m not good at. Memorizing all 206 bones is a lot of stress as well as the muscles and it didn’t pique my interest too much at the time.

The career I ended up finding out about was called Echosonography, it means ultrasound of the heart. I’m going to pursue this career after highschool because of the Medical Terminology class I took a few months back. During that class, we were able to dissect hearts, label them, and learn about the different airways. I always wanted to be in the medical field and do something that relates to the body, so this career was perfect for me because I know I would enjoy it. While in highschool, I’m already taking college classes and getting some prerequisites done before I do anymore of them. My overall plan is to go to KCKCC and get an associates degree in Health Sciences and then go to KU and get into their 21 month Cardiac Sonographer program. 

As a woman in the black community, what we really need is diversity amongst doctors. There are people around the world who refuse to even see a doctor due to the fact that they feel uncomfortable and feel that they won’t be heard. I’ve personally had a bad experience in the dental field. While brushing my teeth, the hygienist told me that I should hold my lips back while brushing my teeth at home. This shocked me because no matter your lip size, no one needs to “hold back” their lips while brushing their teeth when the brush is just moving in your mouth, open or closed. Due to having this experience when I was in middle school, I realized that even though my experience might be deemed as small, there are those who have even worse experiences compared to me and I want to at least be a sign of some comfort in the medical field. 

With my education moving forward, my goal is to be there for people of color in order for them to be more at ease, and they’ll be able to have a good experience at the clinic. Removing their doubts and fears is something I hope is available for everyone, but I am only able to reach so many people. I will reach out to as many people as possible in order to spread change and inclusivity.