Become a Bioethicist

When being a bioethicist there is some options to consider. There is three major career opportunities that a bioethicist could fall into that are shown below.

Career Titles	Post-Secondary Teachers	Physicians & Surgeons	Medical Scientists
Education Requirements	Master's or doctoral degree in bioethics	Science-intensive undergraduate degree and an M.D. degree	Science-focused undergraduate degree and ideally, a Ph.D. and a M.D. degree
Projected Job Growth (2012-2022)*	19% for post-secondary teachers, all other	18% for physicians and surgeons, all other	13%
Mean Annual Salary (2013)*	$73,140	$187,200	$90,230

"Bioethics Career Options and Education Requirements.

The job that a bioethicist may offer comes in different forms of jobs, just like the ones listed above. To consider any of the jobs that one can pursue we have to go to college, study, and get a masters degree or higher depending on the choice of study that someone wants to achieve. A bioethicist would be a great job to consider because of its benefits it offers.

Imagine a world where people are given information to make their difficult situation easier to understand and act upon. That when they are faced with a life or death situation they know that what they chose was the best decision they could have made. According to ECFMG.org, “[A bioethicist] analyzes ethical components of real or potential health care actions/decisions, and provides an ethical justification supporting specific actions or decisions.” To think that a person can help another person in a difficult situation by taking away their riddance. This action will not be disdain because with the education someone takes they will be ready for anything that is thrown at them.

Also as a bioethicist we simply cannot forget the salary! Which is shown above that can range from $70,000 to about $100,000. Of course we can't ignore that to practice these careers we must be valiant. By having this type of salary and helping others can sure motivate us to pursue this career.

We also need to consider that by chasing this career we also benefit everyone and not just one person. Unlike a typical bioethicist at a hospital, someone can be broad and set guidelines for others to follow like in NIH.gov says, “Bioethicists and public health professionals together will need to develop a vocabulary and appropriate methods of analysis for public health problems.” This is future sense, but aren't we the future? We need step up. Have a voice to those who don't know they do. Be a thunder among a quiet valley. Be a straight path in a confusing road. Running to those who need a hero. Running to be a voice.

Of course people can make up their own decisions and do whatever they wish to do, but to be a bioethicist is not to provoke someone into doing a something they don't want to but advise them to what science says is correct. It is to give their opinion and hope they chose to what the patient think is for the best in any given situation. 
Being a bioethicist will benefit someone by helping someone else in their anguish, gain good money, and helping a  broad area of people not just a single person. To be someone in a growing career that is expanding because of the need of knowledge and advice. A bioethicist who knows the problems that we, as a growing new generation, are being faced with with what seems new every day. Pursuing this career will benefit us and others who we one day will become.

The Life of a Bioethicist

My blood rushes. I can hear the silent screams that are happening around me. Step. Step. Step. Another turn and I can be safe. Sigh. I'm here. Looking at the white walls that seem to look yellow now because of time. The screen that stares back at me seems to haunt me, dare me if you will. Telling me to open it up and come and do my job. Well here I go. About 8 years of study to pursue this dream of mine. I reached it and I'm here. Click.

Bangalore, Hospitals. "Blog Details | Medypal." Blog Details | Medypal. Medypal, 1 Mar. 2013. Web. 15 May 2015.

What is a bioethicist to me? It is a way to help others in ways I never thought I could. Being a bioethicist to me would not just be a job, but a way to help others who need advice. To pursue this career would let me reach out to those who are dealing with difficult times and need someone to go to. This works so well to me since I seem to have a knack of doing this so well. Because being a bioethicist isn't just a job you do because you are being paid, but paying attention to what the questions and worries about what will happen or the decision being made.

"Hey, we need you to talk to a family right now," the man who I know as a doctor informs me.
"Yeah sure, what for though?" I ask hoping it might be something not as drastic as yesterday afternoon.
"A man is wondering about choices over life support," he says nonchalant.
"Ok, well I will be with him in a little bit."

What Is Bioethics?

by: Big Think

https://youtu.be/WRZmighdj-s 

It is a typical, average, ordinary day in a high school students life except for the fact that it is a 

Monday, and we all know that Mondays are the worst. Not only do we have to go to school but we 

also have to wait another five days until the weekend. Bummer. So you are in your class and over 

hear Suzie talking to Billy discussing about the college they want to attend and what career they 

want to pursue. Great! On top of it being a Monday they made it worst by reminding you that you 

have absolutely no idea what you want to do with your life. You have asked yourself what are you 

going to do with your life now that you are about to graduate high school. You have tossed and 

turned in your bed countless amount of times asking the same question over and over again 

asking yourself, "What career do I want to do when I grow older?" This is one of the hardest 

questions and most important question since this question leads to a action to which leads to a 

future.


What do I say. What should I do? Of course I'm use to the whole life changing ideas, but I cannot 

get over knowing what I say has a big impact over the decision a patient makes. Being a 

bioethicist has helped me help people's life in so many ways. I make sure though that it is

always for the best. To make their quality of life better.


"So what I'm saying is that it is all up to you to make the decision, but what I told you before is 

your options to make," finally coming to a end to this conversation. There is never a dull moment 

in my job, but I'm grateful to help others the way I do. 


As I leave the room to go to my office I cannot help but think of the life that is being brought and 

the life that is floating out of the hospital at this very second. This job, being a bioethicist, is the 

career I have always wanted to since high school and I can't think of being anywhere else but 

here. Walking down the hall. Going to a office. Making a difference in this world. Being what I was 

called to do.

What is a Bioethicist?

The lights flicker. I hear the squeak of the sneakers rushing by me. I smell fear, joy, hope, and agony all around me and this all sends chill up my spine like ants running through my back. Blue, white, yellow, brown, and a dash of red. Why those colors? Are they meant for me to feel better or to not feel them at all? Whispers seem to dominate this place and it just makes it all the worse. So here I am in a chair. Nothing special. I'm visiting a friend who just had a baby hoping it all went well. That is until I see a person talking to another person. Huh? I hear a shout in the distant, an echo filling the white walls of this building. The person who seems to have had a rough night looks like its day isn't getting any better. The other person tries to calm him down whispering some endless hope I assume. But this person doesn't seem to be a relative, but more like a doctor. But then why does it seem that they are discussing something, because as far as I know doctors tell the news, good or bad, and leave them be with their feelings. I didn't know the answer until I saw the person’s ID tag while he passed by me. It said "Bioethicist." 

What is a bioethicist? 
A bioethicist is a person who deals with moral or ethical issues that is brought up by medical or law issues. It could also be a member of a hospital staff and function as a clinical consultant. They can determine the capacity/competency, decide on end-of-life planning, medical futility, or assist families in making decisions regarding withdrawal of life support.

For example take in mind my story in the beginning. After I searched and figured out what a bioethicist is I then tried to see where he went. Luck had had it that he wasn't that far from his last location. With sweat in my palms and feeling heavier than before I approached the man and tried to make myself invisible but close enough for neither the person waiting or the bioethicist to suspect my presence. 
"What do you mean?" the man with the worried face said.
"Your mother is very ill, and seems to not go any farther," explained the bioethicist. But I couldn't stop listening. I knew I should have left. This is no business of mine, but I wanted to figure out what would happen next. What would they both do.
"Are you saying I should cut the cord Doc?"
"In situations like these, sadly yes, it is best to make that decision."
He then went to explain further information to what I could not understand, but to my understanding he was just informing how it would all go down and he explained the possible situations he could take for his mother.

Who should become a bioethicist?
This profession would not just be a job, but a way to help others who need advice. To pursue this career would it help reach out to those who are dealing with difficult times and need someone to go to. This works well to those who are good at giving device. Being a bioethicist career path could help satisfy the need to help others in ways that can really help their life altering decisions.

To have the opportunity to work in this job seems like a opportunity to pursue a spiritual life with a day to day life. Incorporating beliefs and helping others who share the same values of life. This may come with bumps in the road (isn't there always?) but If someone is willing to take a chance and actually give it a go to successfully become a bioethicist I'm sure it will all be worth it.

How does a person become a bioethicist?
When trying to pursue the career of being a bioethicist it is necessary to take the class of bioethics which is the study and investigation of medical and scientifically new decisions that are being made. This is very important to consider because it covers of what a bioethicist is. Now this can be broken down to types of work one can study and practice:  research programs, advisory/ consultant roles, community roles, academic training, and policy writers. All of which are very different, but cover about the same subject but in different forms.

Why should we need a bioethicist?
Some people may ask why we need bioethicist. The answer is we must take in the consideration of those who have an opinion over certain topics. Whether it's abortion, cloning, or putting someone down. All of these topics are very intense and fragile. To act or do something to this subject can very much impact a life forever, whether it is good or bad. This career choice is necessary to those who may have doubts, concern, or questions of the action that they may do.

What does a career as a bioethicist look like?
A bioethicist can earn a different salary, depending on what job you work in since being a bioethicist isn't a independent field. You can earn less than $50,000 or up to $150,000 a year. Some of the schools to provide this career will be UT Southwestern, UTA, and UNT. 

A specific career choice that is simpler to what a bioethicist is would be the consultant role. To acquire this role you must have a background in law or philosophy and do some ethics training. According to Cedars-Sinai.edu a medical ethics is, "The primary purpose of the CECS is to promote and enable morally appropriate and effective decision-making by those primarily involved in patient care situations." This is helping making big decisions for life changing situations at times. 
As I walk out of this building who holds both life and death in its room. I walk out with some
confidence about my future, because I think I now know what i have in store for myself. And maybe one day, just maybe, a kid will see what I do and consider this career as a job they want to pursue.

The End of this Reading Year

          Eleventh year was a big year to me that seems to have finally ended. I met good friends, lost some best friends, and gained new worlds. These new worlds came in some books, like in Eleanor & Park which changed my life to see what a true love can be like (messy), Fangirl who let me see a glimpse of my new future, Please Ignore Vera Dietz which made me see friends are never lost, the series of Delirium, Pandemonium, and Requiem that strongly made me believe love is what we all need to be who we truly are, All the Bright Places who I will carry in my heart because of its beautifully captured picture of life, Dreamland which made me see this world in a different light, and The Curse and The Winners Crime which I yet need to finish but know will be excellent. The book to which was the only book I surprisingly let go was Remember Me? which was about a woman who forgot her memory about how she became who she became and how to fix her fabulous but disastrous life she made for herself. These were the books that made me happy, sad, and relief all in 450 pages or less.

         All the Bright Places was probably my favorite book. It captured feelings that I would have never thought could be captured in one sentence. So new and old. Feelings that have been going on since as long as we are capable of saying they were. The book which had me yearning for the ending for not all the good reasons? Well I have two. The Infinite Moment of Us and What Happened to Goodbye. Both of which had me twisting and turning on the inside because of the strong negative emotions I had for them. The Infinite Moment of Us was a ball of cheese that seemed to have absolutely no end, and What Happened to Goodbye was a girl who had personal problems that added to mine but had no good ending. And that is what made my reading as a reader hard. Not being able to let go of a book even if I had all the right to do so. This dilemma caused me to take time on a book and impaired me to move on. The area in which I felt strong in was in my likeness on a book. This caused me to finish the book as soon as I could, which helped my reading level.

        In all I felt really good about how I read and understood the books. Having Mrs. Rasmussen as a teacher had me motivated to read all sort of books. Some of which we had to read in the book clubs she held. Which were the curious incident of the dog in the night-time, The Kite Runner, and ROOM. And her reading conferences she had with us helped me personally to to understand these books better, and find other books from outside my shell. What also helped me keep reading was that the people around me as well read with me as a community. It made me feel at ease that I wasn't the only one wiping out a book out of the nowhere and motivated to read as much as I could because there were others who read more than me.

         My reading goal was 17 which was met. The following books are numbered from the first book I read to the book I am reading:

1. The Adoration of Jenna Fox
2. Jesus Freaks
3. The Infinite Moment of Us 
4. Jumping Off Swings
5. Trance
6. Eleanor & Park
7. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
8. Fangirl
9. Please Ignore Vera Dietz
10. Delirium
11. Pandemonium
12. Requiem
13. All the Bright Places
14. Remember Me?
15. The Kite Runner
16. Anna and the French Kiss
17. Being Henry David
18. ROOM
19. Belzhar
20. Dreamland 
21. What Happened to Goodbye
22. The Curse
23. The Winner's Curse
24. The Last Time We Say Goodbye

I believe....

I believe in happiness even if I have every reason to believe not to be. I believe that a better world consists of salt and light. I believe christian music makes you feel better. I believe I can be someone conspicuous but be me even if people will spit at my face with looks of confusion, hate, and bizarre. I believe loving everyone even if they hate me. 

I believe the embrace of my mom is both bitter and sweet and I yet have to figure out why. I believe in love, I believe in tears wept silently in a loud obnoxious big silent room. I believe that watching someone going through the wrong path hurts more than a slap on the face, and that if I ever do see the light at the end of the road, I would regret I didn't get to do everything I shamelessly had the fear to do. 

Everything I hold so dear seems to slip out of my hands, but I stupidly believe that this world is better than it shouts to be. I believe that the mountains that are in front of us are there for a reason maybe to be better or maybe to say that we climbed it I still need to figure that out. I believe in school: studying, reading, writing - tears on paper. I believe that we all have a reason to live even if it's only meant to meet your significant other. 

I believe in pick up lines. I believe "She looked like art, and art wasn't supposed to look nice; it was supposed to make you feel something." I believe kids are a gift not a curse. That loving someone you don't know is possible because its been done before. I believe that a story with someone with a tragic ending is better than not having one. I pitifully believe in happily ever afters. 

Most importantly I believe in Him. I believe He loved me first and if you could only see my heart you would know that I try with every inch of it to love Him back with all I can. I believe in His promises that He has made for me. His words are what makes me live and if you fell on the ground I would heel your wounds. I believe that I will be just like a star. Because when a star dies it still leaves light behind for many years after its disappearance, and just like a star I will keep living in people's hearts and maybe even leave a breath behind. Do you believe in the night sky? I remember staring at the starry night and the sight was a sky full of sparkles and I could almost here Him telling me that every one of those stars were meant for us to enjoy, but I was selfish for just a second to believe they were all for me, and just me. If you were to look at me that second you could have written a poem of my eyes and just how my eyes captured the night sky in them. I believe that is why I love the stars so much. And if someone told He didn't exist I would be the most asinine person in this world. I believe that a life is both a song and a dance and it's up to us who we want to dedicate it for. 

I believe I'll cry tomorrow. I believe that feeling too much is both a blessing and a curse and that is ok. I believe friends are found, and friends who are a accident are the best kind, and if I could somehow do both, I would be content. I believe rain is the most beautiful type of tears, I believe Treat Others How You Want to Be Treated, the earth is a architecture made by Him, and the worst tears shed where in Grapevine Lake on a warm sunny day.

I believe in Peter Pan and that deep down I will never grow up. I believe that I am a big beautiful mountain somewhere where I can be unnoticed and only be captured by wondering souls. So come and hold me and feel that, “I am both happy and sad at the same time, and I'm still trying to figure out how that could be.” I believe I will be grand and for now that's enough.

Happily Consuming

   When I read the poem, "As Life Was Five" by Jimmy Santiago Baca, I couldn't stop but feeling stabbed in the heart. This might sound very extreme, but to me that's how it felt. The anguish that was happening all over my body was happily consuming all of me. So much that I cried while writing out my first rough draft. The poem was alive! It truly was, and I was Jimmy the helpless little boy who turned into a man he was pushed into being.

   During the poem I couldn't stop and picture myself in this situation. Jimmy was I and my father his grandfather.  I saw what what he, my father, has to go through in work, outside places, and in other common places. My father just like Jimmy's tells me to "Portate Bien" because I'm better and I'm destined for greatness. But thankfully I haven't encountered the dreadful moment where I have to see the man who I see strong, kind, and loving being spit on with ugly faces because of his color of his skin. Although he did once tell me of this one moment in his life where he helped a elderly old white person help his wife get in a car. He told me that he, the elderly gentlemen, held on to his hand with both of his hands looked him straight into his eyes and said thank you. Of course this man probably was just saying thank you and nothing more, but to my dad he said he has never felt the true sincerity of a thank you from someone before in his life. And that's how I see my father. Someone who will help. Someone who is part of this world just like anybody else. Someone who I would hate to see being labeled with a word of ignorant because of his lack of understanding and communicating english. He is like the part of the poem where Jimmy says, "His eyes on me like a voice in the wind forgiving and hurtful and loving" with nothing less than that. Because to me I see my father as someone who I admire. He is always so happy, and the thought of him being otherwise because he is "different" makes me sick to the stomach. But my father wakes up everyday and goes to his job knowing subconsciously what might happen and to that I am forever grateful.

   Racism might not ever extinct, but I believe in happy endings. I believe that me and my family will prevail in this dark world. Being both the light and salt to this world. This world has a lot to work on and I will enjoy the stabs in my heart as long as I see the rainbow after the thunderstorm. Growing with this poem has helped me to understand that better now. 

Jimmy Santiago Baca

    Jimmy Santiago Baca talks to us in this poem in first person to directly get the message he is trying to tell. Through the poem he is trying to tell us to not falter and have hope. "Remembering you are human," is a powerful yet simple way of telling us that we can only be so great. By separating the poem into four stanzas gives each stanza great value. It starts with something relatable to something we must do. And this all ties back to having hope, because life can be hard on us but there will always be a beauty in it. The poem informs us just how life can be beautiful in its harshness, "The sun will share your birthdays with you behind the bars." And all of this again goes from weak to strong to being brave. Because as humans we cam only be strong for so long that eventually it comes the time to deal with the reality that we are not as strong as we think we are, and that's when we are called to be brave. So when I picture this poem I see a bright cloudless sky. I feel the wind going at a steady pace, and I can smell spring arriving. I feel calm and at peace knowing that I can do nothing but enjoy the wonderful day inside a cage. But what makes this poem interesting to me is when he says, "And sing, my brothers and sisters, and sing." I could right away connect with this poem in a spiritual sense. Whenever I get sad or have a hard time I tend to listen to gospel music, and I sing with it declaring the already spoken words. Somehow it makes me feel better, it makes me feel as if everything is going to be okay just by singing a song and I think that's what Baca is trying to get through with that thought. To which ties back to having hope, and find a peace within us. This can also be found in how he repeats brothers and sister to not forget that he cares about what we are going through. Overall I believe that what Baca is trying to say is that there is someone caring for us whether it's him, the world itself, or someone who cares for us. They all want us to keep going in life and overcome the mountain we have in front of us with bravery.