CAMPUS COMPASS
Movement Science student helps new students find hoMe BY DREW MOSER
As a Kinesiology peer advisor, Movement Science senior Ishan Bhalgat helps incoming and new students acclimate to the university and our school. He talked with Movement magazine about his time as a Michigan Kinesiology student as his undergraduate career draws to a close.
high school to a university the size of Michigan with a blank slate. I want to help all incoming first-year students seize the most out of their educational opportunities at Michigan and within Kinesiology. MM: How has Michigan Kinesiology prepared you for your post-graduation goals?
Movement Magazine: What has being a Kinesiology peer advisor meant to you?
IB: I’m applying to medical school Ishan Bhalgat: When I came to and Movement Science is the perMichigan, I didn’t know anyfect gateway for this. I feel like the body. I was coming from a small Movement Science curriculum realtown in New Jersey and I had ly provided the opportunities to get no connections to the area other the foundational background needthan my grandparents living in ed to go into medicine. You learn Flint. I was terrified during my about the systems and the integrative first-year orientation. I was meeting nature of the human body through brand-new people left and right but I ANATOMY 403, MOVESCI 230/231, didn’t have anyone I could stick with, as PHYSIOL 201, and AT 220/221. Then, I was the first person I knew who came to the three facets of the Movement Science curthe school, so it was a really big push out of my riculum, motor control, biomechanics, and exercise comfort zone. The Kinesiology peer advisors’ support Ishan Bhalgat. physiology, covers how the brain produces movement Courtesy photo. after interpreting external stimuli, the mechanical prinhelped me feel like I could do this. During orientation, you get bombarded with so much information, ciples of different tissues collaborate and the physical so having that student perspective is huge. I remember how principles associated with movement, and what happens comfortable I felt after that session, so when I became eligiwhen you push your body to the limit in exercise. I view the ble for the position I applied for it. Through my experience, curriculum as a great holistic approach to the body and it’s I felt like I could directly give back to students because I more of a refined learning style compared to other majors can identify with that feeling of outside of Kinesiology. When I took the MCAT, because of discomfort associated with the Movement Science curriculum, I was ready. coming from a small
“I want to help all incoming firstyear students seize the most out of their educational opportunities at Michigan and within Kinesiology.” ISHAN BHALGAT
| MOVEMENT | FALL 2020
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