Semi-Farewell to Kyle
Our newest CPERL member, Kyle Truevillian, has completed his summer internship with us and is headed back down to begin his junior year at Emory University this Fall.
Mary shares: Kyle has brought a new energy to fuel and diversify our lab's efforts this summer. His response to feedback and flexibility allowed us to make unanticipated progress on ongoing projects. This includes earning formal acknowledgement for helping to get a manuscript to publication, as well as presenting on it during journal club so as to reinforce his understanding of its content and also allow our other lab members to get oriented to a line of research in our lab that is less familiar to them. This also includes his contributions to the animations and sound for several YC-PEM and PEM+ optimizations. Finally, Kyle leveraged his experience of working in a research lab during a pandemic this summer to make meaningful contributions to our strategic plan for building an anti-racist lab. Kyle will continue to contribute to our lab's efforts this fall, earning co-authorship on a project that peaked his interest this summer. All in all, his internship was of mutual benefit and we look forward to staying connected with him as he safely progresses in his undergraduate pre-med studies at Emory this Fall.
Kyle shares: There is no formal way to summarize the experience CPERL has given me. Over the course of this summer, I have learned so much about the worlds of occupational therapy, participation, and re/habilitation. I surpassed many of the goals Dr. Khetani and I set for my internship. By spending time in a self study used for learning the basis of CPERL's work on PEM and PEM+, I was able to earn my first ever manuscript acknowledgement and assist with helping to distinguish which articles I believed were relevant to our cause and which were not when screening full text articles for a scoping review. In addition to that, I had the opportunity to learn and use new software to create animated videos and lead out on the delivery of YC-PEM and PEM+ optimizations using a male lead and voiceover. CPERL gave me the opportunity to be instrumental in many projects that would directly affect the lab's status as a credible place of research; this included assisting with the IRB application and our recent efforts to establish our status as an anti-racist lab. Learning the lab's philosophy and outlook on the topic of participation allowed me so much opportunity to look at the world differently. I'll never be able to verbalize how I feel about this experience. I've learned more than I ever thought I would and gained perspective in places I never ever formed thoughts. I'd like to thank Dr. Khetani and the lab for ever taking a chance on me- see you all soon!