The USC Somos Hermanos Student Immersion Program is currently accepting applications for both the July through December 2012 and January through June 2013 program sessions.
Somos Hermanos aims to reduce the health care disparity experienced by Latinos in the U.S. by increasing the number of bilingual, culturally competent health care providers in the U.S. The SIP is a six-month language and Cultural immersion program based in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. The program combines intensive Spanish instruction, a comprehensive lecture series, socially and culturally relevant volunteer projects, weekly activities, and a trip to El Salvador and Mexico to ensure our participants gain the language capability and cultural competency desperately needed to serve marginalized, Spanish-speaking Latino populations.
The SIP targets students who have completed their undergraduate Education and are taking a year (or more) off before continuing on to graduate school in the health professions. We accept students who will be attending graduate school for medicine, dentistry, nursing, psychology, physical therapy, public health, and other health-related fields.
“I went and saw my first patient a couple weeks ago and of course, he only spoke Spanish. I went into the room with a second year student I was paired with (and who did not know I spoke Spanish), and he proceeded to ask the patient the usual beginning questions. When I could tell that the patient did not understand him, I began translating the questions into Spanish and translating his responses into English to tell the second year student. Completely surprised at first by my fluency, the second year began telling me questions to ask him, which I did quite easily and effectively. I ended up translating both ways - the patient’s entire history and physical exam, without the aid of anything or anyone. This was exactly why I wanted to do Somos Hermanos, but I got that out of it, and so much more that I couldn’t have anticipated.” Quote from a past participant currently attending medical school in the US.
The application deadline for the Fall 2012 Session (July through December) is October 31st, 2011.
The application deadline for the Spring 2013 Session (January through June) is also October 31st, 2011.
For more information regarding our program, please visit our website at: www.somoshermanos.org, or e-mail us at info@somoshermanos.org.
