by Lucie Roy
Morinville News Correspondent
A former MCHS student is seeking $6000 in financial support to attend a four-week program in Ecuador, which is a pre-medical trip specific to her career.
Haley Stang told Rotary Club of Morinville members during her Feb. 17 presentation the proposal is with EcuaExperience, a Canadian based company offering Pre-Medical and Volunteer Programs.
Stang graduated from MCHS in 2014 and is currently enrolled at the University of Alberta, pursuing Medicine and eventually Surgery Specialty. She is enrolled in Honours Physiology to pursue medicine, and then cardio vascular surgery.
The Ecuador program provides students with three opportunities to help those less fortunate learn firsthand knowledge about the medical field and discover the diversity of a developing nation.
Stang said she would learn by shadowing doctors, surgeons, and healthcare professionals providing care to local people. There are medical rotations involving surgery, sports medicine, radiology, obstetrics, emergency aid, internal medicine, and pediatrics. Shadowing opportunities include lab components and individual cases. The team will build houses alongside the local community and then donate the houses upon completion. There is a four-month project to build 20 homes in the rural community of Jama in 2016. The new houses would have natural cross-ventilation, be earthquake resistant and made of local sustainable materials.
Stang said she believed the Ecuador trip would further her knowledge and passion for volunteering. “As an active member of society, it is important to me to enrich myself in philanthropy while always learning along the way,” she said. “The intent is [that] this trip allows me to combine my passion for volunteering with early experience to my career choice while discovering another lifestyle and culture.”
Stang has had a long history of volunteerism and was a founding member of the MCHS Rotary Interact Club in 2014. During that year, she was involved in a humanitarian trip to Mexico that included restoring a church playground and visiting orphanages and families living in a dump.
In addition to being Captain of the Senior Volleyball team and Assistant Coach for the Sturgeon Volleyball Club in 2014, Stang was also involved with the Careers, Next Generation to help high school students in their career after graduation. She did one year at the Health Intern-Citadel Care Centre in 2013 and a year at the Health Intern-Sturgeon Community Hospital in 2014. She was also the Health Spokesman at the 7th Annual Future Circle Event.
Stang continues her volunteerism. She is currently an active member of the University of Alberta’s Rotaract Club and is a President-Elect Candidate for their elections in March and serves in a Leadership role in the Subcommittee on Community Service.
Stang has volunteered at the Mustard Seed sorting clothes, created hampers at the Edmonton Food Bank, and volunteered at Ronald McDonald House. Stang is currently on the Sub-Committee of the Ronald McDonald House. At Westmount Junior High School she is the Co-founder of the Mentorship Program for at-risk youth, which begins in March. The program’s goal is to meet at least once a month to develop leadership, goal setting, character building, and career building skills.
