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Name: Ebrar Zeynep Yilmaz
Class Year: 2023
Major: Biochemistry
Hometown: Boston

Internship Organization: (WHF)
Job Title: Public Health Education Intern
Location: Boston

What’s happening at your internship?

I am currently working with the Public Health Education Department under the supervision of Dr. Sibel Guzel. Each intern in this group has their individual projects that they are working on and we just started on a group project possibly applying to get national grants to fund it. I have done a Powerpoint slide on e-cigarettes to inform parents about the dangers of e-cigarettes for teenagers. I am also working on writing a news article about how press freedom is maintained while misinformation is prevented during the COVID-19 pandemic, to publish in science magazines. I have also worked on smaller scale projects with the web design team to edit the content for the newly launched website, recorded a voiceover for the “Sexually Transmitted Diseases” Powerpoint slide, and communicated with the global branches of WHF for information and visuals for the newspaper that they will publish soon.

Why did you apply for this internship?

I was part of their pre-med student mentoring program and I thought doing an internship at Whitetulip will help me meet medical specialists who are top in their field and work on projects that I care the most about.

What has been your favorite part of this internship?

My favorite part of the internship is how I can create a project that I deeply care about and meet specialists from those fields. I’ve been really passionate about functional medicine and nutrition and through the connections that Whitutlip provided, I was able to meet Dr. Bulent Ugurlu; we will start working on a project in the near future. Also, the friendly and open environment my mentor, Dr. Sibel, creates makes it more enjoyable to work with the group.

Working remotely for the first time? What has that experience been like for you?

It was my first time doing a remote internship and it was harder than I expected in many ways. When you are at an office setting it’s easier to get work done since everyone around you is already working on something. But you need to spend extra effort to stay motivated and focused when you are doing work from home. Also, forming close relationships with mentors, supervisors, and other interns is easier when you are in person. However, through weekly Zoom meetings, I think our group was able to overcome that challenge. Overall, this remote internship gave me self independence and made me more flexible in terms of timing. I can do work at night and that still counts towards my hours.

Visit the Summer 2020 Internships page to read more student stories.