Connecting with kids is a passion for Dr. Aaron Palmer, a neurosurgeon at Summa Health.
His outreach to teens— encouraging them to pursue careers in medical fields— was on display during the Future Healthcare Leaders’ Summit.
The event, organized by Summa Health, brought more than 200 students from Akron Public Schools to the University of Akron, where several workshops took place on Tuesday.
Palmer worked with groups of teens and showed them how to suture pigs’ feet.
“It was interesting. It was fun. It’s like a puzzle,” said Tradarius Grantham, a junior at North High School.
Grantham and fellow North student Reeber Htoo both want to go into the medical field.
“I just want to learn how to fix people up— in case— so that I could take care of my parents when they get older,” Htoo said.
Grantham felt that learning outside a traditional classroom setting was valuable because he considers himself a “hands-on” person.
“I want to be a biomedical scientist. I want to be able to learn the technology to be able to help people,” he said.