Roza Thavrin feels a mix of emotions when her classmates tell her they don’t have time for a mentor. As a busy PharmD and MS student herself, she understands the impulse to spend every available moment on studying. But as a student paired with an alumna mentor, she wants her classmates to have the kind of experience that she has enjoyed with her mentor, Miranda Howland PharmD ‘08.

“When I tell my friends that I have a call scheduled with my mentor and can’t hang out with them, they often say, ‘You have a mentor? How do have time for that?’” she said. “I tell them that it’s not a huge time commitment, and that it has been very beneficial to me.

“I describe Miranda as my guide to life as a Pharmacy student!” she added.

Roza vaguely recalls seeing an email about the UGA Mentor Program, and having been in a similar program through the Rho Chi national academic honor society for pharmacy, she decided to enroll and was paired with Miranda, a pharmacy manager with Northeast Georgia Medical Center. 

“I want to be an encourager,” Miranda said of her motivation. “It’s conversation and sharing experiences. I enjoyed mentoring students through the American College of Clinical Pharmacy, and when I saw a message about the UGA Mentor Program I decided to try it.”

She hopes that more Pharmacy alumni will participate, both to be a resource for students and to reap the benefits that she has enjoyed from her relationship with Roza.  “We all have more to offer than we think we do, and the time commitment is not as great as you might think,” she said. “What you offer may seem small and insignificant to you, but it is very meaningful to the student.”

To learn more about the UGA Mentor Program, see here.