Like pretty much every other college student, I was excited for my study abroad program in Copenhagen, Denmark, and of course ended up having an amazing experience. Unlike most students, I spent the last week of my abroad program in a Danish hospital after fracturing my ankle in three places. However, as a student at Tulane, I was in a unique position with an outstanding crew of professors, staff members, and friends that quite literally helped me to get back on my feet again.
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| Taking a hands-on approach to learning about the Danish health care system |
On the bright side, my injury came towards the end of my four-week summer program in Copenhagen, Denmark. Tulane has several great summer programs that let you to take two classes with a Tulane professor while abroad. I was taking an introductory neuroscience course and an animal behavior course, and had awesome time exploring Copenhagen and eating pickled herring for the first three weeks. When I got hurt, I ended up having to go to the ER and waiting to have surgery for about twelve hours. I was really lucky to have made some great friends on the program that stayed with me in the hospital, and then continued to come back and visit me throughout the week as I recovered. One of my friends even switched her flight so she could help me get through the airport on my flight back to Chicago! The three professors on my program came to visit me in the hospital too—even the dean of students, Dean James Maclaren, came to see me, despite the fact that I wasn’t a student in either of his classes. My constant stream of visitors kept my spirits up. It was a strange, challenging experience to be stuck in a foreign hospital for about a week, not to mention being pretty much immobile, but the great group of people on my program made it the absolute best that it could be.
Because I was unable to take my final exams, my professors gave me a huge extension on my last week of work in my two courses. I was able to take my animal behavior final online a few weeks later, once I was back home in Chicago and had been able to recuperate a bit. For the neuroscience class, because I had missed some lectures, my professor, Dr. Beth Wee, and I met up in the fall when I had returned to school. She took time out of her jam-packed schedule and met with me numerous times to teach me all of the material that I had missed, and then let me take the exam as soon as I was ready. This wasn’t really a surprise though, as Dr. Wee is pretty well-known on campus for constantly going the extra mile for her students. Both my professors were so accommodating and went out of their way to be helpful, giving me all the time I needed until I was ready to actually finish everything. They also continued to check on me throughout the semester as I recovered.
My freshman year, I participated in an experience before classes started called the NOLA Experience. On this program, first-year students get a chance to come to Tulane a week early and do fun activities to get to know the city. It was one of my favorite parts of my first year, and I continued to participate in the program as a student leader, or an ‘OC’, my sophomore and junior year. This experience has since grown into the Explore program, offering programs with a variety of themed experience for freshman spanning everything from food to sports to journalism. For my senior year, I was especially pumped to participate as an OC in a newer program called Greenie Camp, named after a former Tulane mascot. In early July, I had returned home from Denmark and had a second surgery a week later. I was set to be on crutches for a good few months. I knew that this would affect my participation in Greenie Camp, and I was crushed. Beyond that, I didn’t know how I would make it through the semester on crutches. With a heavy heart, I wrote an email to my staff leaders, Jered Bocage and Peter Young, who work in the Alumni House. I explained to them my situation, and I told them that I hoped I could participate in the program, but I could understand how my participation might be more of a hindrance than a help. Realistically, I couldn’t imagine how they would want to deal with me being on crutches as we headed to an off-campus retreat center and traipsed around New Orleans for a week. I sent off the email, expecting that my days as a Greenie Camp OC would be over before they had even started.
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| My Greenie camp buds wheeling me around the French Quarter |
The next day, I had gotten an email back from Jered. As I read his email, I realized how lucky I am to be at Tulane and to have so many wonderful people in my life at school. I couldn’t keep the grin off my face as I relayed the email to my mom. Jered acknowledged all my concerns but quite simply and firmly told me they had a strict policy: “No Greenie left behind.” He told me to come back as planned, and they would do whatever they could to help me participate in the program, while also planning to be flexible in case I was doing too much. Feeling optimistic again, I crutched off to Tulane to start my senior year.
Once I arrived on campus, it truly hit me how difficult my semester would be. At home, I had my parents and siblings to help me with everything—getting up and down stairs, helping me make my meals, driving me places. I was worried about how I was going to get through the semester. It turned out that I had nothing to worry about. I was so fortunate to be part of a group of ten OC’s—a stellar group of student leaders picked to lead the program. I was soon blown away by how much they were willing to do for me. My friends came through for me in an incredible way. We went on an overnight retreat on the program, and I was worried about having to crutch all over a camp center—my friends pushed me in a wheelchair all over the camp so that I could get to all of the activities. Admissions counselors Morgan England and Jeff Schiffman were also staff leaders on the program, and helped take care of me as well. Morgan would zip around the city in her tiny smart car with me in the passenger seat to transport me to places like Café du Monde. As the week continued, I grew more and more appreciative of all these amazing people. When the program was over and we jumped into classes and extracurriculars starting, I was still able to rely on their help, along with some assistance from other friends.
I live off-campus, about a ten-minute walk, but there was no way I could crutch to campus and all of my classes. Luckily, Tulane has an Office of Disability Services (ODS), which was kind enough to provide me with some short-term help. For the first few months of the semester, my friends would laugh as they witnessed me getting chauffeured around campus on a golf cart. I also had many friends that volunteered to drive me to and from campus for my classes and for various extracurricular meetings. Every once in a while I would get into a tough spot and need a quick ride, and there was always a friend willing to drop what they were doing to come and get me. I never could have gotten through this semester without them.
Even though having a broken ankle and being stuck on crutches for three and a half months was not the way I wanted to start my senior year, I honestly feel extremely blessed. I have so many amazing friends that came through for me during this rough time. People were willing to drop what they were doing to come and pick me up, essentially chauffeur me around, and take me to dinner and other fun activities so that I wasn’t just stuck in my house all semester. I absolutely, positively could not have made it through this semester if it had not been for a really special group of friends, faculty, and staff members that went above and beyond without a second thought. My parents were worried about letting me go off to school with such a big injury, but they were so impressed by how much others were willing to do for me. If I had been anywhere else, I don’t think I would have had professors that were willing to do whatever it took for me to make up my work, staff members that bent over backwards to accommodate me, and friends that were there for me every single step of the way. But like Jered said, no Greenie left behind. Tulane is a really special place, and this semester, hard as it was, also served as a great reminder of how amazing Tulane, and the people here, are. So moral of the story—try not to trip down the stairs when you are studying abroad, but if you do get hurt, Tulane will be there for you.
By Sam Patel
