MARCH MINUTES: A student hire at the March clinic balances work, children and college

  • Published
  • By Belinda R. Bell
  • 452 AMDS
Originally from Alma, Ga., Belinda Bell is a federal "student hire" employee who works for at the clinic at March Air Reserve Base, Calif.  Here, she shares a day in her life as she balances school, home and college commitments (the date she tracked was Thursday, Sept. 29, 2011).

0653 Made it to work in record time. I smell the coffee brewing and see the fax full of documents. That thing gets worked overtime.

0715 Another message for Sergeant Pfizenmaier, Line of Duty manager. He's just as busy as the fax. Now, back to pulling records for doctors' review.

0801 OMG. Time to open the window. Customers are waiting, and Chief Levy reminds us of a VIP appointment today.

0847 Tech. Sgt. Stonum is calling for a record. Must work fast to keep up with her. She is always busy in Room 18.

0915 Printing shot records, reviewing profiles, checking medical readiness and I still haven't even opened my Outlook.

0920 Faxed out repeat records requests and resent emailed profiles. Sometimes, I think this stuff gets sent directly to a shredder.

1017 Out processing members for TDY to Texas, Nevada and Spain. I remember having fun on deployments to other countries. Go Navy!

1048 Lucky day, I logged into AHLTA. Let's see how long it takes before I'm kicked out of the system again.

1130 Lunch time. Got to pick up my son, take him to the sitter, grab some lunch and continue packaging records for PCS transfers.

1217 Shared a funny story about my kids with Master Sgt. Chavez. We always laugh about the crazy things our kids say and do.

1335 Email reminder of quizzes due tonight and Sunday. I'll do that Saturday after the kids workshop at Home Depot.

1427 Doing the mail run and made it to TMO in one piece. The cart is slow but it gets the job done. It could use a radio and A/C unit.

1520 Yeah, FedEx delivery of records. Time to beg for supplies from Tech. Sgt. Collins. Feed him and we get whatever we need.

1558 More patients. This window doesn't close until the last patient is served. "Customer service" is what we call it.

1618 Shutting down to clock into my second job which includes chauffeuring kids, homework, dinner and laundry.

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