Besides taking your normal course load as a college student, Caltech students have the opportunity to take some very cool nontraditional classes that teach useful life skills! One such class is our Health Advocate program, which teaches emergency first aid and approves you to be your house’s friendly go-to for medical needs. We also have the opportunity to volunteer at local events for first aid.
The class runs for all 3 terms for 3 hours in the evening. The instructors, Mark Stapf and Virgi Mateo, have taught the course for a very long time (and have volunteered with the American Red Cross for even longer)! An unofficial instructor is Virgi’s dog, Monty, who is very careful in his inspection of your life-saving techniques.
During the class, we go through the entirety of the American Red Cross Emergency Medical Responder (EMR) course, which teaches us about basic anatomy and physiology, medical terminology, and life-saving techniques. We also have training to help us be the good responders for Caltech: we learn about over-the-counter medicines so that we can distribute them when our housemates need them, and we participate in Caltech Connect, which trains us in helping a peer with suicidal thoughts. Throughout the course, we learn useful skills like CPR, how to help a choking patient, and learn how to quickly identify and treat all kinds of ill patients. We even get our own personalized bag of first aid supplies and medicine!
At the end of the class, we are thoroughly tested on everything we’ve learned through the year on both paper (3 tests total!) and real life, where we go through several mock (but very realistic!) situations with pretend patients to test our skills in an emergency. The paper tests are used to certify us with the American Red Cross as an official Emergency Medical Responder. Once everyone has finished their tests, Mark and Virgi host an annual celebration at Pasadena’s Buca di Beppo.
It’s been very cool to be a part of the Health Advocate program! I’ve learned a whole lot about how the body works and how best to help others in an emergency, and I’m able to give back to the Caltech community. These skills will be with me for a long time after graduating!
