Abstract

Across health professions, minorities and individuals from disadvantaged backgrounds are grossly underrepresented[1]. To correct this imbalance, several programs have been founded to increase diversity in healthcare professions, most of which focus on college age students[2]. This initiative focused on early intervention, working with children in 7th -12th grades. This program aimed to stimulate interest in healthcare careers through a booth- based fair. Professionals from the community came to the Boys and Girls Club where 16 students cycled through the booths to experience each of the careers, including the UCF’s MD program, NOVA Physician’s Assistant Program, Alternative Medicine/Acupuncture, Clinical Social Work, Occupational Therapy, and Music Therapy. Before the fair, students filled out a 4 question survey gauging familiarity, interest, perceived difficulty, and perceived attainability about each career. The students visited each booth for 10 minutes, and had additional time at the end to re-visit booths. After this time they filled out a post-fair survey, with the same 4 questions about each career. Pre-fair and post-fair differences were evaluated using a two tailed paired T-test to determine whether the fair affected the students’ views about the careers. Qualitative data was obtained as well to evaluate the barriers and attitudes towards healthcare. A total of 13 students completed the surveys. The trends in the data confirm that the fair increased familiarity, increased interest, decreased perceived difficulty, and increased perceived attainability leading to the conclusion that this method is an effective way to increase knowledge and interest about the careers in healthcare in this population.