Some Pomona College students already know they want to be physicians. Others are undecided, but are considering a future in healthcare research, counseling, public policy or biotech. And others are moved to explore the medical field by personal experiences.
All of them want to change lives with their work and explored healthcare careers this summer with funding support from the Pomona College Summer Internship Program (PCIP).
PCIP provides Pomona students with generous stipends for multiweek unpaid or low-paid internships that offer experiential learning and professional insights—career-building opportunities that might not be possible without funding support.
Here are four students whose internships broadened their understanding of healthcare and provided hands-on career experience in cardiology, hospice care and mental health private practice.
Holding a human heart in her hands
A few weeks into her PCIP-supported internship at the UC San Diego School of Medicine, Ella Lee-Guest ’29 found herself in the operating room, holding a human heart in her hands. After just one year of college, she was observing a heart transplant and helping to collect tissue samples for testing.
“It was something I never imagined I’d be doing at this stage,” she says.
Lee-Guest, who hails from San Diego, knew she wanted to be a surgeon when she reached out to Dr. Eric D. Adler, professor of medicine and director of the heart transplant program at UC San Diego about a research internship.
Now, after a summer in his lab investigating how genetic variants can influence heart disease, she finds herself with an interest in research as well.
“As a physics major, I was drawn to how much of cardiology is physics,” she says. “The heart is a pump, and many of the questions the field asks are about pressure, flow, force and conduction. I wanted to explore where that kind of thinking connects directly to patients.”
In the lab, Lee-Guest worked with mouse models, prepared mouse organs and human cardiac tissue, and performed molecular techniques to examine protein expression and fibrosis.
Outside the lab, she attended a conference on heart failure. Surrounded by people passionate about their work, she was inspired by clinical trials and the impact on real-world patients.
The internship confirmed Lee-Guest’s career objective and added a new dimension. “What’s changed is that I now understand what it looks like to be a physician who also does research,” she says, “and how much of translational work depends on people who can fully understand both sides of the puzzle.”
Researching cutting-edge developmental cardiology
When Mirabelle Pitt ’28 was 11 years old, she had open heart surgery to address congenital aortic stenosis.
This summer, she had an opportunity to intern in a lab doing promising research into a new, non-invasive treatment for the condition. Thanks to PCIP funding, the Brooklyn, New York native spent the summer at Gladstone Institutes, an independent biomedical research organization in San Francisco.
Pitt is majoring in public policy analysis with a concentration in chemistry because she wanted an interdisciplinary program that focused on science. She is considering a career in medicine but also weighing possibilities in public health, health policy or biotech.
The internship gave Pitt a chance to explore her interest in developmental cardiology. She investigated what labs were making the most headway in the field and reached out directly to Dr. Deepak Srivastava, the principal investigator of a lab at Gladstone, offering to bring her own funding.
The lab is using mouse models to see if a drug treatment has potential to treat aortic stenosis in humans. Pitt assisted in activities such as genotyping and breeding cohorts of mice, worked with stem cells and analyzed how changes in a certain gene affect the cells, and even observed mouse echocardiograms.
“I think this experience would not have been possible without PCIP,” she says.
Understanding life, loss and happiness in hospice care
Max Eastman ’27 spent his summer studying for the MCAT exam and interning, with PCIP support, at Preferred Hospice in St. Louis, his home town. “I was interested in seeing some of the inner workings of the healthcare field, and this position seemed like a great way to gain that experience,” he says.
That up-close look at the career field underscored Eastman’s choice of a future in medicine. “It has confirmed that caring for people gives me a deep sense of satisfaction and contentment,” he says, “which makes me really excited to pursue a career in healthcare.”
Eastman, who is majoring in molecular biology, spent the summer with patients nearing the end of life, along with their caregivers and families. He learned that compassionate care requires a meaningful relationship with the patient.
“There is not a single person on the caretaking team—from activities directors at nursing homes to CNAs, RNs, and MDs—who does not make connections and form relationships with their patients,” he learned. “Healthcare is a career in which you must form connections with those you serve, and to fail to do so is to fail to care for the patient to the best of your ability.”
Eastman found the friendships he formed with patients to be the most meaningful part of his internship experience. “I have learned so much about family, love, loss, grief, happiness, life and death this summer,” he reflects. “I plan on taking the lessons I have learned from each patient with me throughout my career.”
Sharpening skills in mental health private practice
What is the latest research on treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)?
How is insurance billed for mental health visits?
How does a licensed counselor connect with the community to build a private practice?
As Amaia Sherman ’28 interned with Jenny Pelo Counseling Services in Englewood, Colorado, this summer, she learned what day-to-day life would be like in her intended career as a mental health practitioner.
The PCIP-funded experience solidified her desire to earn a master’s in social work after graduating from Pomona and become a counselor in a school or private practice.
Sherman sought out a private practice internship because it offered exposure to many aspects of the profession, among them client care, research and community outreach. “I knew it would allow me to develop both my clinical knowledge and professional skills,” she says.
During her internship, Sherman, a psychological science major from Littleton, Colorado, researched neurodivergence and OCD and learned a variety of evidence-based treatment modalities such as play therapy and dream therapy.
She also participated in case consultations and helped with business operations, from website content development and marketing brochures to billing.
Sherman learned how important it is to tailor therapeutic approaches to individual patient needs; there is no one-size-fits-all counseling methodology.
Reflecting on her internship experience, she says she found that effective mental healthcare is collaborative. “Research, collaboration and compassionate care,” she says, “all work together to support clients.”