Danielle Bortmes discusses life's 'big events,' future plans
Mindy Townsend, Collegio Reporter
Issue date: 4/20/06 Section: Campus Life
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"I was not planning on it at all," said Bortmes. After applying for a spot, Bortmes, a graduate of Girard High School, was selected to be an SGA senator. During her first year, she served on the Big Event committee. Big Event is an annual community service project sponsored by SGA. Bortmes says that then-SGA community affairs director Lindsay Carson asked Bortmes to help with the Big Event and eventually made her assistant director of the project. This year Bortmes became the Big Event director. Planning for a community service project as vast as Big Event is no small feat, although Bortmes says that the load is relatively light in the fall. She had to write a letter to the city and get the various forms ready. But the spring semester is something different. Bortmes says that she worked in the SGA office six hours a week and sometimes took some work home with her. She and her committee also had to coordinate the job sites, meaning that this year they had to visit 88 different sites in two weeks. But none of this happened in a vacuum. In addition to her SGA duties, Bortmes is active in the PSU Pre-med Club. She says that as juniors they start learning how to run the free clinic at the Wesley House when they are seniors. As far as kicking back, Bortmes says that she's almost forgotten what that is. She says studying for the MCAT has taken up most of her free time and that she's not sure what she'll do with herself once it is over. She adds that after she celebrates, she'll probably catch up on classes. Bortmes also models swimwear a few times a year. She has an agent in Joplin and, when there's time, travels to Dallas to model for different boutiques. She even has what she calls "a big poster" hanging in Vintage Stock stores. Even though she enjoys modeling, Bortmes says that it's not worth it if her schoolwork suffers. "If you can miss classes, it's really good money," she said, "but it's not worth it if you can't catch up." After she graduates, Bortmes wants to enter the Oklahoma State University medical school. The medical school at OSU is a Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine. Bortmes says D.O training focuses on the whole body and making sure everything is working properly, while M.D. training focuses only on what is wrong at a given time. "Sometimes I think D.O.s are more thorough," she said. Bortmes has a sister and three stepsisters who live with her mother in Chanute and a stepbrother who lives with her father in Oswego. |
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