What was your first job ? My first summer jobs were at the publishing company where my mother was employed . I worked there for four summers during high school and college : I did data entry the first summer and then for the next three summers I drove a forklift and packed books into boxes for college bookstore orders . It was the kind of job in which I arrived in the morning and never stopped working until my shift ended . It made me really appreciate hard work and how important it was to keep going in my career . It was a very different job from the one I have now and probably any other job I ’ ve had , but I took a lot from that experience . |
Ross Levine , MD , with his daughter |
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When did you know you wanted to go into medicine ? For me , it was always going to be about science . Both of my parents were involved in medicine , directly and indirectly – my mom was in medical publishing and my dad was a dentist – but , more than anything else , they just encouraged me to follow my love of science . As a kid , science was what I enjoyed and where I exceled . I continued pursuing it in college , where I learned relatively quickly that , though I loved all of science , I particularly enjoyed the more practical aspects that could be applied to the real world . Once the science turned to theorems and hypotheses and more abstract concepts , it became less interesting to me than solving a |
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“ For me , it was always going to be about science . [ My parents ] just encouraged me to follow my love of science .“ |
specific biologic or chemical problem . At that stage , medicine was a potential opportunity where I could take my interest in science and use it for a more tangible , specific endeavor .
Did you consider any other careers while you were in college ?
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Based on my other interests and experiences as an undergraduate at Harvard , law was the other obvious career option . I was on the parliamentary debate team in college and , as you might imagine , the majority of the people in that setting ultimately went into law . It certainly wasn ’ t my preferred career path , but I |
really enjoyed my time on the debate team .
Where did your interest in debate start ? I tried different extracurricular activities in high school , and I found that I most enjoyed debate and public speaking . Harvard had a robust debate program ,
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