WSU student Michelle Bryant speaks with a group of students during the break-out session.

Jira Coumarbatch, M.D., assistant professor of Family Medicine and Public Health Sciences, tells high school students how he became a doctor.

The Wayne State University School of Medicine’s Office off Diversity and Inclusion recently conducted a mentoring event for high school students interested in becoming physicians.

Younger students often lack the necessary support provided by mentors. The Medical Science Careers Series seeks to give high school students a glimpse at how mentoring impacts the lives of students interested in science, technology, engineering and mathematics careers. Participants included students from Cass Technical High School, Martin Luther King Jr. Senior High School and the Benjamin Carson High School of Science and Medicine.

The March 14 event began with an overview of formal and informal mentoring by De’Andrea Wiggins, interim director of Diversity and Inclusion. “Mentors are an important influence in both your personal and professional development,” she told the students.

Other speakers included:

Michelle Bryant, a Wayne State University undergraduate student, who shared her experiences as an honors student majoring in Psychology. Bryant is an advisee of Deborah Holland, pre-med advisor for Diversity and Inclusion and staff advisor for the Minority Association of Pre-Medical Students.

Jira Coumarbatch, M.D., a Family Medicine physician who provided his story of overcoming adversity in his pursuit of becoming a physician.

Patricia Wilkerson-Uddyback, M.D., an Emergency Medicine physician and vice president of Medical Affairs for Harper University Hospital and Hutzel Women’s Hospital. She provided valuable insight to students and had them repeat that they “will go to college” several times.

The guests led students in small discussion breakout groups. At the end of those discussions, each group had a representative share what they learned as a result. Those group representatives included Chris Ransburg, Krishna Paul, Tarence Arrington, Sakina Rahman and Tiffany Griffin.