Bryce Mortera is a third-year PharmD candidate at the University of Cincinnati James L. Winkle College of Pharmacy and was the 2022–2023 Region 4 APhA–ASP Regional Delegate.
My journey with APhA–ASP began during my first year at the University of Cincinnati (UC) James L. Winkle College of Pharmacy, where I started out as a chapter policy vice president (PVP). My vision for what I wanted to accomplish that year as a PVP was fairly cloudy in the beginning, but I knew I wanted to stick to a few general themes that I was passionate about: expanding access to care and helping improve the quality of patient care being provided by student pharmacists. Passion is something that I think is incredibly important for anyone considering or participating in any advocacy or policy role, and it’s what makes the work enjoyable because you’re the one helping to create the change you want to see happen.
APhA–ASP presented itself as the ideal platform for transforming these aspirations into reality.
As the year continued from spring, summer, and then back to the fall semester, I continued to try and familiarize myself with different issues facing the profession. By then, I had attended my first student legislative day with the Ohio Pharmacist Association (OPA) and had an opportunity to begin to take my passions forward into action. OPA, the other student pharmacists, and many of the legislatures and staff members all created an environment and energy that was centered around change. It was something that I still remember whenever I’m describing the experience to others or preparing for another legislative day.
Motivated to serve
My first experience as a PVP and advocating with OPA continued to spark my interest in having a larger impact, not just at the local level. I was fortunate that fall to attend the Region 4 APhA–ASPs Midyear Regional Meeting (MRM)—which was held right across the river in northern Kentucky—where I was elected the 2022–2023 Region 4 APhA–ASP Regional Delegate This meeting presented me and my future co-regional officer, Maria Nguyen, with the opportunity to take our involvement to the regional level. Shortly after the MRM, APhA staff and the APhA–ASP National Executive Committee wasted no time at all in getting us involved and working on different pieces of policy or communication outreach, and preparing things for the 2023 APhA Annual Meeting and Exposition in Phoenix the following spring.
Reflecting back to that time, I realize that I had no idea what I was signing up for, but I was motivated by my friends, my chapter, and Maria. This motivation and support would be needed to encourage me both to run and continue to get through the policy meetings, the precise language and background research for policy statements, and hosting regional webinars.
A commitment to change
As APhA2023 got closer, I got to work collaborating on two different resolution statements that would be addressed at the APhA–ASP House of Delegates (HoD). These statements were exciting to work through because they were inspired by several different chapters from across the country who all saw problems and wanted to make change happen. We were able to successfully redraft, provide additional research, and then have these statements be presented and voted on at the HoD.
I remember being nervous that one of the two statements would not pass due to several other previous statements working to address opioid education training for student pharmacists, but that our statement would attempt to fill a gap that we had identified while doing research into the statement. When the votes were counted and displayed, we came out with the statement passing the HoD, which now could begin the long implementation process of helping to improve the quality of opioid education for future pharmacists.
A commitment to people
Creating change is hard, especially when the current state of things is complicated by existing interest and motivation to keep things the same. Discovering your why is what has helped me to find reasons to stick through and continue forward when the process to create change is often not so glamorous or fun. Finding good people along the way to help support your goals and to advocate with you is also something that has supported me so far in doing policy and then creating action (it’s also more fun that way too!).
When I look back at my first-year’s goals as a PVP, it really is centered around finding what people need, and then discovering how best to serve them. Making sure that I came back to this idea is what helped recharge me and allowed me to find ways to make it through the obstacles that presented themselves. What I would recommend to anyone looking to go into a policy or advocacy role is this: find your why and let that help guide your actions.