Ellen Morgan is a Dietetics student at University of Plymouth and has been elected as the BDA Student Rep for 2022/23. We asked her a few questions around why she applied for the role and how she hopes to champion the voice of Dietetic students in the next year.
Why did you apply to be the new BDA rep?
After posting on my Instagram about my experiences on placement and as a Dietetics student I connected with other Dietetic students and found it really helpful to share tips and experiences with each other. I want to use my role as Student Rep to continue these connections on a bigger scale and help students help each other.
I look forward to the experiences this role will bring, being able to help bring students the benefits a BDA student membership offers and help enhance the student membership to make it even more helpful for students.
What would you like to achieve during your time in the role?
I am passionate about connecting dietetics students from different universities to enable us to share experiences and tips with each other through social media and discussion forums on the BDA student section.
I also feel students need more support while on placement and want to be able to help provide that. It can be a challenging and exhausting time and I know after speaking to fellow students about this they also feel the same. I want to help students believe in themselves and feel supported during this to help enhance their experiences and get the most out of placement.
What made you choose dietetics as a career?
I always knew I wanted to work in healthcare and have always had a strong passion for food, having always enjoyed cooking and baking from being a child. I wanted to be able to help people through lifestyle choices and food rather than medications if appropriate and when looking at careers in the NHS I found out more about dietitians and knew it was for me.
What route would you like to pursue in your career?
I am particularly interested in paediatrics, especially after my placement at Bristol Children’s Hospital over summer which I loved! However, we’ll have to see what my next placement brings and where my dietetics career takes me!
What’s the best advice you’ve been given?
To believe in myself and my abilities! I think everyone could do with believing this, particularly on placement. You’re capable of more than you think!
How did you arrange your placements?
My first placement was online due to COVID and so I joined patient appointments online with the dietitian. My second placement was based at Bristol Children’s Hospital and I absolutely loved it! We’re allocated our placements by the university based on our preferences and so I only had to contact the hospital to arrange where to arrive on the first day and let them know of areas I was interested in as well as a bit about myself.
Why is it important that students become BDA members?
The BDA has so many useful resources for students such as the food fact sheets which are extremely useful for placement, the student forum where students can help each other, and free access to two specialist groups you are interested in to help you learn more about them.
The membership also means you get access to exclusive webinars which are great for learning about a range of topics and access to PEN which is a great resource for summarising the evidence for a variety of topics.
All these things will help to enhance your experience as a student and really get the most out of your degree.
