ASU students create platform to help fellow pre-health Sun Devils succeed

For some students, leaving a place better than they found it applies to their academic lives just as much as their personal and professional ones.

Brooke Keith, a medical studies student in the College of Health Solutions, developed this outlook early in her first year at Arizona State University. After experiencing a hiccup with her schedule, Keith started looking for ways to support herself and others in similar situations.

She connected with Parmis Keyhanzad, a health care administration and policy student in Health Solutions, and the two of them got to work.

“We spent hours trying to figure out what’s best for us,” said Keith. “We did research all the time trying to figure it out and were asking pre-health students, ‘What do you think about this?’ or ‘How did you manage to take this class?’ It just kind of helps you break down the process step-by-step.”

That research led to Bridge Health — an initiative that brings existing ASU resources together with firsthand student experiences. Through this venture, Keith and Keyhanzad seek to help their peers feel more informed and prepared for what comes next.

“Bridge Health's main goal is to be a network of opportunities for students — undergraduate, graduate and alumni — to be able to access it as a ‘sister’ to the pre-health advising network,” said Keyhanzad. “All this information will be there as a guideline to help them on their pre-graduate school journey.”

Designed as a Canvas course, Bridge Health organizes information into modules for each pre-health degree track. It provides guidance on schedule organization and choosing classes, as well as tips for drafting cold emails, requesting recommendation letters, and finding clinical hours and shadowing opportunities. The course includes Q&As and advice from ASU alumni, along with information about connecting with faculty and staff. 

“Think of it like when you do six loads of laundry and put it on your bed — we’re the ones that kind of fold it and put it into piles,” Keyhanzad joked.

“This institution is vast, and it’s incredibly resource rich in its support of our students,” said Ron Hicks, College of Health Solutions assistant dean. “But sometimes you don't know about things because you didn't get connected in the right place. I would rather a student say ‘I chose not to engage in that,’ versus ‘I wish I would have known because I would have gone.’”

Keith and Keyhanzad first brought the idea of Bridge Health to Hicks, who saw it as an opportunity to complement existing support with something different: a student perspective.

“I think the biggest reason why a lot of students don't really understand or connect with the (advising) material is that it's given by people who are not in their shoes,” said Keith. “I think the biggest thing that a student trusts is another student that’s in the same boat.”

Hicks believes the student-led aspect is the strongest part of the program. 

“To me, it really gives a lot more validity to what they're doing because it is their passion, their ideas,” he said. “I think we need to continue to cultivate that and find ways to implement those opportunities for our students.”

Bridge Health also includes a social aspect. Keyhanzad and Keith see it as a way for new students to support one another as they adjust to college life.

The program launched on Aug. 1 and will be introduced only to first-year students in CHS 101: The ASU Experience for Health Solutions. Keith and Keyhanzad have aspirations of expanding it collegewide, and eventually universitywide, to provide all pre-health students with the same opportunities and insights.

They also created a succession plan: As members of the Undergraduate Student Government Downtown (USGD), they will embed Bridge Health in USGD so it continues after they graduate. Future USGD senators will be trained to use the platform and add resources, keeping it up to date and student led.

“I think we have a really great opportunity right now as ASU Health is building the medical engineering school, and there's so much expansion happening,” said Keith. “It would be amazing if we could be the number-one peer-led resource for ASU Health as a whole, creating spaces that are going to be long term, so when we've graduated, students are still learning.”