Citrus College has a wide array of clubs available, but a new club named Doctors of Tomorrow is part of the Citrus community with much to offer. The club initiated this spring after several years of Citrus not having a pre-med club.
Doctors of Tomorrow started with president Matt Serna and vice president Jasmine Quezada. The idea came to life when they attended a medical conference from the National Hispanic Medical Association College Health Scholars Program at Pomona College and wanted to share all the knowledge they gain to other students at Citrus.
In contrast to four-year universities, community colleges students do not have much accessibility for internships and programs to help them in their career and must look for their own opportunities.
“We can help our members network, we can help them find opportunities that may not be as visible to community college students as maybe someone at a university,” Serna said.
The purpose of the club is to form a community for students who have an interest in the medical field, where they can gather together and help each other to become future doctors.
Quezada said, “We want to put this together for kids to join and to prepared because the medical field in general is very competitive.”
A future goal of the club is that they want the Doctors of Tomorrow to be known off-campus by networking. When they send applications to medical schools, the goal is to be remembered from being a part of Doctors of Tomorrow.
“There is power in numbers, and if all of us together are able to meet a person and bring them in for everyone can meet, I feel like our name will get out there,” Quezada said. “It will be rememberable when we are all applying for medical school.”
Networking and internships are the kind of support the club wants to offer to their members to become a more competitive candidate for medical school.
In the club’s first meeting, they mentioned COPE, a program offering students to start working on their hours for medical school by shadowing doctors and the availability to volunteer in a hospital. The club guides their members in how to accomplish the requirements they need to meet as future medical students.
“We want our members to feel that they a part of something and to be able to relay in each other, rely on me and the officers,” Serna said.
Doctors of Tomorrow provides resources for students to start their medical journey but also want to give and show support.
“ My goal for this club is to promote our health scholars on campus,” Serna said.
Doctors of Tomorrow meets every other Monday at 4:50 p.m. at the PS Building, room 203.
