Jennifer Donato, Class of 2011, Nottingham, MD

What are you up to? At this moment, I will be starting my career as a clinical pharmacist at Frederick Memorial Hospital in Frederick, MD and will be taking an exam to transfer my Connecticut Pharmacist License to Maryland so I can practice in the state of Maryland.

How'd you get here? I graduated from the University of Saint Joseph School of Pharmacy in May 2018. A short month and a half later, I started my post graduate year one (PGY1) pharmacy residency at St. Vincent's Medical Center (SVMC) in Bridgeport, CT. During residency I gained a ton of experience in different areas of clinical pharmacy within the hospital. After 3 months had gone by, I had to decide what I wanted to do when this residency program was over. In November/December 2018 I had decided to apply to various hospitals across the country for a post graduate year 2 (PGY2) pharmacy residency program in critical care. While applying to the various hospitals, I could tell my heart was not in it although I loved my critical care and emergency medicine rotations at SVMC. I did not receive any interviews from the programs I had applied to and not only did I notice but my mentor at SVMC had noticed I was not heart broken over the rejections. With the help from my mentor, I had decided to finish residency with a positive attitude and see where life would take me. And that's when I decided to move to Maryland when residency was over to start my career and my life too, since my boyfriend was already residing there.

What are your goals? My future goals are to become a board certified pharmacist in pharmacotherapy and to continue to grow as a clinical pharmacist.

Jennifer Donato, 2011, Oakville, CT - January 17, 2018

What are you up to? Currently, I am in my last year of pharmacy school at the University of Saint Joseph School of Pharmacy in Downtown Hartford. This program is unlike a traditional pharmacy school where you do 2 years of pre-pharmacy and 4 years of pharmacy; instead at USJ SOP, you must received a bachelors degree prior to being accepted and then do 3 full calendar years of pharmacy. I am also in the process of applying to pharmacy residency programs.

How'd you get here? After graduating from WHS, I attended at the University of Bridgeport and received my bachelors of science in health sciences. Unlike a lot of people who I knew in high school, I knew that I wanted to do something in the healthcare profession, specifically pharmacy. So during my time at UB, I took prerequisites for pharmacy school, along with your general education courses, and courses in health sciences. It was super stressful applying to pharmacy school because I had to maintain a pretty high GPA in order to be competitive, my personal statement needed to be unique, and if the school was interested in me, I had to go through an interview process. And as a young adult at the time, I had never had to go through a professional interview. While going to school, I also had a part time job at ShopRite Pharmacy in Southbury. This job really solidified the fact that I wanted to go to pharmacy school and become a pharmacist. By March 2015, I knew I was accepted into USJ SOP and was excited to continue on the journey towards a rewarding career.

What are your goals? My goals for the future is to become a clinical pharmacist in a hospital. I would love to be board certified in critical care, where I can work in an ICU. This would require me to do two years of residency.

What has been your biggest challenge? My biggest challenge was during my junior year of college. At UB they have a contract with UCONN where I could apply to their pharmacy school and I'd be looked at as a UCONN student rather than an outsider applying to their program. At the time, I did apply, but unfortunately did not get an interview. Although this may not seem like a challenge to most, I was devastated and had to decide whether or not I wanted to try again the following year and earn a bachelors degree as well. If this didn't happen to me, I wouldn't be where I am today.

What has been your happiest moment? My happiest moment was this past September/October. I was in Arizona/New Mexico for school, working at Gallup Indian Medical Center. This hospital is for Navajo Native Americans who live on the reservation. They are underserved and struggle everyday. At this hospital, there are pharmacy run clinics where the pharmacists see the patients and change medication therapy depending on what clinic the pharmacist is working in. The clinics ranges from diabetes to asthma clinic, as well as anticoagulation (blood thinner) clinic to HIV clinic. I also had the opportunity to live on the reservation. It was definitely a culture shock. There is nothing for miles around and some people are still live without running water or electricity. It was a meaningful experience to understand how the Navajo people live. On a positive note, I did get to do some traveling and see parts of the United States that I didn't think I would ever be able to see.

Advice for WHS Students? If you know what you want to do right out of high school, go for it! It might not be easy and you may not succeed right away, but in the end it will be worth it. Work hard and don't let others bring you down for wanting to do something different. This is your life and you only get one of them.

If you could tell your high school self one thing, what would it be? Confidence is something that you gain over time.