College of Arts and Sciences Newsroom

By Skylar Christian ’25

For students pursuing a career in the medical field, finding community and hands-on experience can make a world of difference.

At the University of Dayton, Healing Hearts offers all of the above — fostering connection, developing leadership and providing meaningful service opportunities for students in pre-health tracks.

Healing Hearts is a student-run organization open to anyone pursuing a pre-health path, including pre-medicine, pre-dentistry and nursing. The club focuses on service, with monthly meetings and larger initiatives such as volunteering with Remote Area Medical (RAM), a nonprofit that sets up pop-up clinics for underserved and uninsured communities around the U.S.

Healing Hearts’ advisor is Elizabeth Rhoads, executive director of the Pre-Health Resource Center and senior biology lecturer. She said the group continues to grow its reach and deepen its impact.

“The program not only helps students get clinical experience, it also helps them gain practice with patients and the healthcare environment, offers leadership opportunities, and helps them learn about other life experiences and perspectives,” Rhoads said.

Healing Hearts hosts service activities at nearly every meeting, and the student-led executive board plans everything — from local events to the highly anticipated annual RAM trip.

Earlier this year, 15 University of Dayton students piled into University vans and made the drive to Tennessee to volunteer at RAM. While there, they received hands-on training and supported medical, dental and optometry services.

The RAM experience is fast-paced and intense. Volunteers may work in triage, assist with dental procedures, clean patient areas or help manage logistics.

For John Rosch, a senior pre-medicine major from Wheaton, Illinois, who currently serves as club secretary, the RAM trip helped him better understand his passion.

“I always knew I wanted to go into medicine, but seeing the work up close just gave me a broader scope of the field,” he said. “It reaffirmed that this is what I want to do.”

Greta Stalter, a junior pre-dentistry major from Brookfield, Wisconsin, and current Healing Hearts president, said her RAM experience this year spanned triage in the dental area to assisting with oral surgery — something few undergraduates get the chance to do.

“I helped guide patients to the right procedures and even supported some of the extractions,” she said. “You never know what you’ll be assigned to until you arrive. That flexibility taught me a lot about adapting quickly in a clinical environment.”

Stalter and Rosch emphasized how the organization offers accessible, meaningful ways to engage in service — something not easy for students without transportation. 

“Having easy on-campus service events that are high impact and for a great cause is what drew me in,” Rosch said. “We do things like make journals for underserved children, decorate cards for Dayton Hospice and paint pumpkins to deliver to local senior centers. These things may seem small, but they make a difference.”