How to Become an Ambassador
Health professions faculty and health professionals who care for and about needy people have an extraordinary opportunity to help America meet a primary need: improving access to care for the 64 million Americans who need it.
- Let yourself be known!
Write articles for campus and/or local news media. Place NHSC information on campus. Attending meetings of student organizations and introduce them to yourself and the NHSC.
- Advocate for primary care!
Get to know local clinicians, campus leaders, State and local government officials to see how you can collaborate to better serve needy people. Refer students and clinicians to the NHSC.
- Mentor!
Students and clinicians with whom you are in regular contact can benefit from your counsel -- and help you get the most out of the exchange.
- Recruit!
Hold NHSC information sessions. Put up posters. Remind students and clinicians when applications are due.
- Train!
Establish student rotations in community-based clinics. Find opportunities for students to shadow clinicians who care for needy people. Help to establish a cultural competence curriculum. Encourage students to learn a foreign language that will help them care for patients who speak limited English.
Primary Care Health Professions Faculty
- Allopathic and Osteopathic Physicians (Family Medicine,
Internal Medicine, Obstetrics-Gynecology, Pediatrics, Psychiatry)
- Nurses (Nurse practitioners and Certified Nurse-Midwives)
- Physician Assistants
- Dentists and Dental Hygienists
- Behavioral and Mental Health Providers (Health Science Clinical or Counseling Psychologists, Clinical Social Workers, Marriage and Family Therapists, Psychiatric Nurse Specialists, Licensed Professional Counselors)
Community-Based Professionals
- National Health Service Corps Clinicians, Alumni and Administrators
- Clinicians
- Educators
- Others who work in public health, health care policy
- Become members of a Federal program.
- Have access to data pertaining to the Ambassador Program and its affilitates.
- Have direct access to information and technical assistance from other Health Resources and Services Administration programs.
- Attend annual conferences with Ambassadors from across the Nation.
- Participate in learning sessions and training available to Ambassadors through the National Health Service Corps.
- Become partners with the NHSC and other national, state and private organizations.
- Have opportunities to author materials and training manuals for future Ambassadors.
- Become change agents who will achieve results -- an increase in the number of students, clinicians, residents and communities that become involved in improving primary health care and increasing access to services in underserved areas.
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California
Ambassador Blends Goal of Increasing Minority Enrollment with NHSC Mission
For Les Howard, having a sense of mission in one's life is inextricably tied to community and responsibility. This is what he learned growing up disadvantaged himself. It is how he lives his life, and it is the single-most important message that he brings to the students under his careful watch. As program director of the San Joaquin Valley College (SJVC) Primary Care Physician Assistant (PA) Program he sees himself perfectly positioned to pass on the values and resourcefulness that have inspired his own remarkable life. For Howard, the National Health Service Corps (NHSC) is one of his most important allies in the task of sending the best and brightest of his graduates to care for California's underserved communities.
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