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Natalie Babin

KINS 4306

Reflection Paper

Dr. Kaninjing

April 6th, 2021

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Introduction

My name is Natalie Babin, a Public Health senior at Georgia College and State

University. For my last semester at Georgia College, I had the pleasure of interning at Oconee

Valley Healthcare in Greensboro, Georgia. There, I interned under Allison Hawk, the Marketing

and Outreach Coordinator. Oconee Valley Healthcare started in Greensboro 20 years ago. Since

then, the clinic has expanded to four office locations in Greensboro, Lake Oconee, and

Milledgeville that collectively oversee 12,000 patients. Oconee Valley Healthcare clinics have a

total of 20 providers that specialize in services such as Medical, Dental, Pharmacy, Wellness,

and Women’s Health. The company is a non-profit community health center that is federally

funded to provide both a sliding-scale program and a 340B drug pricing program for the patients.

This permits the lower-income and/or uninsured patients to have proper access to primary

healthcare. The company’s mission and purpose are to provide cost-effective and accessible

primary healthcare to all people with the highest quality of customer service.

Description of Experiences

As an intern at Oconee Valley Healthcare, I had an abundance of jobs throughout the

semester. My title was the Marketing and Outreach Intern. Therefore, I perform alongside the

administration and healthcare team in providing marketing and outreach to the community and

company. My day to day tasks varied, but there were several tasks that remained the same every

week and/or month. These consistent tasks include providing updates to health center groups and

local counties, publishing the company weekly newsletter, attending virtual community

meetings, overseeing the Little Free Pantry Project, etc. The Marketing and Outreach

Coordinator has several outreach duties to accomplish yearly. Unfortunately, certain

circumstances caused many of these events to either be canceled or become virtual. This meant I
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was unable to perform most of the outreach activities that would originally take place during this

time. The Marketing and Outreach Coordinator works under the Chief Clinical Officer, so some

of the tasks I completed were jobs she gave to both me and Allison to work on. Some of these

tasks involved working on the Community Health Needs Assessment, putting together reference

manuals for Medical Assistants and Patient Account Representatives, and organizing the

provider meeting packets. Allison and I were also supposed to collectively work with the Quality

Improvement Coordinator on a project that required getting patient’s feedback about the

company. Inopportunely, the focus group project fell through due to the lack of patient

involvement.

I came into this internship with an open mind since I had not narrowed down a specific

job interest for after graduation. There were several exciting and rewarding parts of my

internship, but I would say my project, the March Madness Healthy Living Competition, was the

best. This competition is something the company does yearly to promote a healthy wellness and

fitness lifestyle within the clinic. I took this project on in hopes of increasing the morale in the

clinic after dealing with COVID-19 this past year. The competition was four weeks long and we

had five teams of two participate. The four weeks consisted of exercise, healthy eating,

positivity, and tracking steps. Having each week be a different component of health and fitness

allowed for an exciting competition. Although I did not participate myself, seeing the photos of

the teams’ participation motived me to stay active and eat healthy alongside of them. The

participation remained consistent each week, which was a rewarding factor. I also thoroughly

enjoyed working on the 20th anniversary video with Allison. We came up with interview

questions to ask the CEO, some providers, and board members. During the interviews, their
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answers made me realize how special Oconee Valley Healthcare is, and how every person that

works here truly enjoys coming to work every day and making a difference.

This internship motivated me to step out of my comfort zone. Diving into the marketing

aspects of the job was initially challenging. At first, I was unsure if I would like the marketing

and social media side of this job. I had to learn to appreciate how important marketing is for the

company and how it benefits the patient outreach as well. Like I previously stated, a huge part of

the internship intended to be company and community outreach. Sadly, incorporating safe

community outreach opportunities and working in and around the COVID-19 restriction

guidelines at Oconee Valley was difficult. I wish I could have partaken in the spring community

outreach activities that were supposed to occur. Events such as A Walk to Wellness, Teen Maze,

and Southland Jubilee were all either canceled or changed to virtual. I was unable to contribute

to any of these events. I recognize how important community outreach is and just how much the

lack of outreach could hinder the people. I wish I could have been a part of these amazing

opportunities.

Perception and Evaluation of the Internship

My internship experience at Oconee Valley Healthcare was exceptional. I could have not

asked for a better supervisor and coworkers to work alongside. I originally wanted to complete

my internship at St. Mary’s Good Samaritan Hospital in Eatonton, Georgia. Though, the hospital

was only accepting two interns for the semester, so the lady transferred over my information to

Allison at Oconee Valley. Allison was fairly new at her job but didn’t hesitate to take on Oconee

Valley’s first intern. Within the first couple weeks, I realized the dynamic of the organization

was very family-orientated even though the clinic is rapidly growing. Both Allison, my

supervisor, and Carri, her supervisor, were always open to my ideas. When I was originally
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working on my project, I decided to alter some aspects from the last year’s competition, and

Carri was immediately on board with what I wanted to change.

My internship site supervisor did an excellent job coaching me on how to complete each

task. She kept a respectable balance between giving me opportunities but not leaving me

overwhelmed with all her responsibilities. There is this stereotype that interns are just there to do

busy work, but I felt as if Allison and I worked together on most things and it was never just

pointless busy work. The only way my experience could have improved, was Allison giving me

more potential jobs to do that were out of my comfort zone. This could have forced me to see

what kinds of tasks I am good at or what I enjoy doing.

If I were to recommend any internship site, Oconee Valley Healthcare would be at the top

of my list. This organization is hastily growing and is a great opportunity to get your foot in the

door. I enjoyed this setting so much that I decided to accept a job offer at Oconee Valley

Healthcare. I hesitated to accept the job at first, but then I realized I would not find a better

setting for a first-year job than Oconee Valley. The Population Health Coordinator position

allows for ample opportunities to grow in my career as well as continue to let the company

prosper.

Internship Preparedness

Georgia College prepared me well for the internship. While I couldn’t have been fully

prepared, I felt as prepared as I could have been for a real-life job experience. Although the

internship mainly consisted of marketing and outreach tasks, I could still see how my Public

Health background helped me. Allison graduated with a Bachelor of Agricultural Business and

Agricultural Communications degree. We worked well as a team due to her knowledge of

marketing and my Public Health education. I felt most confident working on the Community
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Health Needs Assessment and looking at the UDS reports because I had experience in those

topics. I was able to fill the gaps that Allison was struggling in. I was least confident in

marketing and creating social media for the company. Fortunately, this was a task that once I got

an understanding of, I was able to continue doing. For example, I completed the company

newsletter every week. This turned into a task I looked forward to doing every week.

The Public Health courses I took helped me become more self-aware of what goes on in

the world. Classes like Community Health and Introduction to Environmental Health helped me

understand the issues in the world and I was able to carry that understanding into my internship.

Introduction of Public Health allowed me to grasp the concept of social determinants of health

and how that can affect an individual’s personal health and well-being. Some of Oconee Valley

Healthcare’s priority population are the individuals that lack these social determinants of health.

The idea of promoting Public Health is to apply preventive measures to better the community.

Oconee Valley does this by striving to incorporate cost-effective care for the lower income to

have proper access to primary healthcare. When creating my project, classes like Health

Promotion Program Planning and Methods of Health promotion came in handy. I was able to

recall what it takes to create a successful project and use SMART goals to get a positive

outcome. The School of Health and Human Performance does an excellent job creating courses

that surround Public Health. Although, in order to better prepare Public Health students for the

future, I would suggest requiring courses that are more business or administrative designed.

Public Health can be a broad subject that can include many other degrees. I think incorporating

classes that focus on business, management, taxes, insurance, etc. could drastically help prepare

Public Health students for a future career in a Public Health position. Georgia College as a whole
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should offer courses that pertain to more real-life scenarios, that could prepare the individual for

life after college.

Internship Performance

Over the course of the internship, I learned some new skills and expanded my knowledge

within my position. This internship enabled me to gain first-hand exposure of working in the real

world. I quickly grasped the understanding of how vital collaboration work is in a clinical and

administrative setting. Every task I completed reflected on my supervisor as well as her

supervisor. Every employee at Oconee Valley Healthcare has their own duties, but ultimately it

is all intertwined. With this being said, I also developed an innate understanding of making

deadlines. The Chief Clinical Officer would often give Allison and I tasks that needed to be

completed the day of. Most of these tasks were simple tasks, but it also led up to something more

important.

I was satisfied with everything I did for Allison and Carri during the internship. Allison

and I worked to the best of our abilities in the circumstances we were under due to COVID-19.

Although, the projects we did get to complete went very well. I was very proud of how the

participants in the March Madness Healthy Living Competition performed and their motivation

to execute each week to the best of their ability. I worked hard on writing up the project outline

and made sure every detail was included so there was no confusion. This internship allowed the

opportunity to expand my knowledge on different aspects of Public Health and permitted me to

even narrow down a specific job interest. There are skills I still need to improve on before I start

the Population Health Coordinator position at Oconee Valley. With this position, I will be

working with several different insurance companies that all use different computer programs. I

must develop a deeper intellect of computer skills/programs in order to excel at my job.

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Personal/Professional Insights/Benefits

This internship has greatly impacted my personal, professional, and academic goals. My

personal goal this semester was to go into the internship with an open mind and complete any

and every task without hesitation. Having an open mind really allowed me to see what I enjoy

and what I do not. It also helped me realize what kind of tasks I am good at and what I can

improve on. I wanted to perform my best at the internship, but I also was focusing on finding a

job for after graduation. I have never been the type of person to jump at an opportunity or take

the initiative to grab the opportunity for myself. Although, once I realized there was a position

open at Oconee Valley Healthcare, I knew I had to quickly approach the Chief Clinical Officer to

know more about the position. This is when my personal and professional goal for the internship

lined up. I was able to secure the position very quickly since the hiring manager, which happens

to be the Chief Clinical Officer, knew me and what I had accomplished this semester.

Academically my goal has remained the same, I do not plan to gain a master’s degree at this

moment, but maybe some time down the road if it could benefit my position. My confidence in

myself has grown immensely from this internship. I took it upon myself to secure this position.

Now I get to continue my internship as well as begin a new professional job.

Working at Oconee Valley Healthcare has humbled me. This community health center

works based of federal funds to allow all individuals access to healthcare. Some of Oconee

Valley’s patients would not have access to primary care without the clinic’s sliding scale

program. During my internship, I interacted with agencies who partner with Oconee Valley

Healthcare to raise awareness, educate the community, and find ways to better the community.

The clinic’s advocacy is a huge part of their way to reach patients and I am happy to say I was a

part of this.