Human Anatomy at Colby

Last summer I did an internship for an FQHC (Federally Qualified Health Center) company based in Waterville. The project I completed for this company was the establishment of the procedures and policies for their in house telepsychiatry program. Over the course of the internship, I was able to shadow psychiatric nurse practitioners and gain a deep understanding of federal and state policies surrounding healthcare. Before this internship, I was interested in pursuing a career in medicine, but I didn’t know if it was for me. Having had this experience, I felt driven to take the next steps in deciding if medical school would be the right path for me. Outside of the EMT Jan plan, Human Anatomy and Physiology seemed like the closest thing to a medical school course that I could take in terms of pace and material. So I decided to give it a shot. 

When the class started it was clear that I had never dealt with this much information all at once before. However, professor Klepach framed the class as a growth oriented, low stakes trial of this type of learning so I was not worried about the material. I was confident that I would find ways to deal with the content if I gave it enough time. Over the course of the class, I learned a lot about myself as a learner and developed some more refined study methods. More than coming up with better ways to study, I became confident that no matter what the situation, I had the ability to come up with study methods to fit any material. 

In terms of the material itself, anatomical and medical jargon also became easier to understand over the course of the month. At the start, I spent a lot of mental energy trying to remember every term individually. For example, the definition of endoneurium vs that of epineurium. What I found at the end of the class was that rather than learning the definitions of terms individually, I was treating medical jargon more like a language. To continue the example from before, I would learn the definitions of endo and epi, and then I would just know that neurium referred to neural tissue. Towards the end of the class, learning terms became far easier because I would break down the terms to understand what they meant rather than memorizing the definition. 

I was a little nervous going into this class because Jan Plan has always been a difficult and stressful time for me. The cold weather and lack of sunlight during the month of January really have an effect on my attitude and health. That being said, this year’s Jan Plan was the best that I have had at Colby so far. Despite this class being demanding, I found the material to be so interesting and the whole process of learning how to learn better was very rewarding. All while leaving time for the other passions in my life. I don’t know if medical school is the end all be all for me yet, but after taking this class I feel more confident that I could handle it.

As a first year, this class was not at all what I expected from my first January Term. All fall, people I met told me how relaxing Janplan can be. I was expecting to go skiing almost every weekend and have lots of time each day to simply relax. However, when combined with baseball, I had little time to relax and even less to sleep. This course demanded a lot of focus and hard work. That being said, I am extremely happy to have taken the class.

Because of the amazing amount of material in such a short amount of time, I was forced to develop strategies to study efficiently and complete assignments quickly. This led to the development of many good habits that I will continue to practice throughout the spring semester and my next several years at Colby. Learning how to get yourself in the right mindset to study is important. Sitting down with the materials is one thing, but in some courses, I will check my phone or browse the internet for 20 even 30 minutes before actually doing anything productive. In this course, the material was quite interesting to me so actually getting started was not too challenging. But this idea made me want to know what it is that will make me most efficient in classes that I don’t necessarily enjoy. Lastly, this course allowed me to understand what my priorities are and the order in which they fall. Family, school, and baseball are my first three priorities. When I had to choose to play basketball with friends or study, I would look at this list and choose to study. This system is a little too clear cut to deal with all decisions, but it allowed a starting point for managing my time.

A specific topic I enjoyed in this class was the Central and Peripheral Nervous System lecture. Briefly learning how nerve fibers work and produce these sensations that our minds can consciously process is ridiculous to me. This sentiment can be summed up in a quote that Dr. Klepach includes in his emails, “You don’t need the iPhone: you have the most exquisite apparatus in the known universe sitting right in your head – the most complex organization of matter in the entire universe. And here are we, feeling a little depressed, feeling like we’re not getting where we need to be, when really you might be exactly where you need to be” (Jon Kabat-Zinn). This quote discusses that all our lives have meaning and backs it up with a real and astonishing scientific fact that is often taken for granted.

At the end of lectures, Dr. Klepach would include topics of disease as they relate to material. These small bits of information were quite fascinating to me. It let me get a taste of the power of understanding anatomical and physiological relationships within the body. This interest of mind peaked during our Grand Rounds projects and presentations. Investigating a case and learning all about the causes for disease and treatments was quite interesting. Furthermore, hearing my classmates’ talks was also quite interesting. Never before had I been surrounded by so many people that shared this curiosity and enjoyment of medicine.

Charlie Furlong

I started college almost two and a half years ago with a hardline goal: I was going to graduate Colby with a 4.0. Somewhere in the depths of my high school naivety, I saw a 4.0 as a true reflection of my determination, willpower, and raw intelligence. I was ready to forgo nearly anything to achieve this goal. Now, as a junior, I know a 4.0 is simply not going to happen for me, and I am really at peace with that.

Through his Anatomy and Physiology JanPlan, Dr. Klepach has shown me what it means to be genuinely successful. I think that it is often very easy for students to blindly equate good grades with success without stepping back to acknowledge the larger life lessons embedded in every course. I will admit that as a Colby student in a largely objective major, it is really hard for me to separate my numerical performance in a course, whether it be high or low, from my brainpower, work ethic, and overall self-image. However, Dr. Klepach’s persistent emphasis on redefining how students and professors view education was refreshing, uncomfortable, and mind-blowing for me all at the same time.

A&P with Dr. Klepach was a JanPlan like no other. One of my friends in her third year of a nursing program, who has taken more A&P classes than even she knows what to do with, was stunned when I first told her about this course. She could not believe that I would really get anything out of a full A&P course in four short weeks (or three if you have the flu for one of them). While we certainly covered an unobtainable amount of material with Dr. Klepach this January, this class became about so much more than just the raw material and it was, at least for me, an immensely transformative month. Dr. Klepach’s mission to free his students’ approach to A&P from the stress of grades and a “winning” performance resonated with me. I had entered this course expecting to slave over this material, to abide by my original pledge to sacrifice all other aspects of my life for an ‘A.’ But after a few days of listening to Dr. Klepach advocate for the importance of stress management, adequate sleep, personal time, and exercise, I was inspired to change my JanPlan plan. I spent an extra week at home in early January to ensure a full recovery after a long ten days with the flu, and by the time I was back at Colby, I was skiing nearly two hours each day, nailing the NYT daily crossword, reading and listening to so many books, and still feeling prepared for each A&P lecture, quiz, and test. I am really looking forward to taking all of Dr. Klepach’s philosophy for a wholesome education with me into the new semester and I cannot thank him enough for his dedication to and excitement for every one of his students.

Abbey Sykes

Going into this class, I knew that it would entail a lot of very complicated material, as well as a heavier work load than a normal JanPlan. However, I was interested in learning more about the human body and how different systems function together. While this class was challenging, with advice from Dr. Klepach throughout the semester I found different ways to manage stress, and I developed different study habits to help me learn all of the information we needed to. I found this class very interesting, specifically the unit on the cardiovascular system. I enjoyed learning about the heart and how it works together with other systems in the body to help us function. I enjoyed the pig heart dissection as it allowed us to be able to see the different anatomical structures we learned about in a real heart. I decided to take this class as I have an interest in Anatomy and Physiology, and I am not fully sure what I want to do after Colby. However, I feel that this class has opened up the idea of entering  into the health services. Some of the things that helped me realize this were the tour of Inland hospital, as well as the talk by Dr. Caroline Lafave. These two events gave me more information of what it would be like to work in health services, and made me more interested in possibly pursuing them. I also really enjoyed listening to the Grand Rounds talks. They provided a wide range of topics in either advances in medicine or case studies, and I was able to recognize and understand the cases as some of the things we had learned about in class were discussed. Overall, this class gave me a lot of information about the human body. However, it also taught me methods of stress management, different study habits, and possible careers for the future.

Alexandra D.

Martyna Czarnik 

If anatomy has taught me anything, it is that the human body is anything but black and white. It is stronger than I believed, yet more fragile; it’s more complex, yet simpler than I believed. One can say, I am a walking contradiction. Coming into this course, I expected to pull all nighters, make ten upon hundreds of flashcards, and have absolutely no time to eat, sleep, and exercise. That could not be further from the truth. 

While I did study, spend hours in the anatomy class, and prepare for each lecture and quiz, I also found time to go skiing, try new recipes, and get the recommended eight hours of sleep. And yet, information was being thrown at us at an incredibly fast pace. At the beginning of the course, my stress levels were high, the usual. I was not sure if I could keep and I doubted my abilities. And then, seemingly overnight, I began to love it. I loved reading the lecture texts, studying my personal heart model, and researching case studies. I was shocked. Why made this class so different from any other fast paced, highly saturated class I had taken in the past two and a half years at Colby?  

Dr. Klepach is the answer to my long sought after question. It was thanks to him that I finally realized that my health is more important than my grades. Instead of studying for hours, I found new study techniques and adapted. I studied for Anatomy and Physiology without having to neglect my happiness and physical health. I found peace in filling out the wellness logs each day, documenting my meals, sleep, stress, and exercise. Even after this class, I will continue logging my days. This documentation guided me in making better meal decisions, wanting to get 7 + hours of sleep, and running that extra mile.

A&P, embarrassingly after 20 years, has taught me that success is not a grade. So while success may be an objective goal, it just occurred to me that I am allowed to celebrate subjective success too. I do not have to feel bad that I missed class because of a migraine or that I could not study another hour because I could not stay focused. I can celebrate logging my day, running 15 miles instead of the usual 6, being happy two days in a row, and even joyous that I have gone two weeks without a running injury.

So, Thank you from the bottom of my heart Dr. Klepach!

I found this course immensely enjoyable due to the fascinating subject matter, kind classmates, and the relentless energy of Prof. Klepach. I felt fortunate that I had some background in anatomy and physiology, because without that I would have found it much more difficult to stay afloat; so I have immense respect for students in this class from non-STEM backgrounds who were learning a lot of this material for the first time. That couldn’t have been easy. I also appreciate that my background allowed me to devote non-studying time to other pursuits, such as my Honors research and CER work. I liked that I didn’t have to scale back on other endeavors to spend time studying for this class. I was also able to spend a lot of time with my friends this JanPlan, which historically has not been the case. During the EMT JanPlan there was no time, during sophomore JanPlan I was dealing with an illness, and last year Pre-Med Academy had me working night shifts, so this was the first January that I got to spend whole days or afternoons spending time with my friends and enjoying myself.
I particularly enjoyed the pig heart dissection. Models and diagrams are great, but it’s different to hold an organ in your hand and understand the scale and proportions of it. I had also never thought about how much a heart would weigh until I got to hold one. I enjoyed cutting through the heart muscle to look into the ventricles, and finding the moderator band was very exciting. I also enjoyed looking at the patent foramen ovale in the heart that we all passed around; getting to apply the concepts we learned in class that day was especially enjoyable.
I got a lot out of this class and I’m so glad I took it.