Zack Shaffer, August 19th, 2024

Title

Zack Shaffer, August 19th, 2024

Description

In this interview, Zack Shaffer shares his journey of getting his PhD from Wayne State during the prime of Covid-19.

Publisher

Detroit Historical Society

Rights

Detroit Historical Society

Language

en-US

Narrator/Interviewee's Name

Zack Shaffer

Interviewer's Name

Taylor Claybrook

Date

8/19/2024

Interview Length

8:12

Transcription

Taylor Claybrook: Today is Monday, August 19th. My name is Taylor Claybrook, and I'm sitting down with.

Zack Shaffer: Zack Shaffer.

Taylor Claybrook: Okay. Thank you, Zack. So I'm going to get started by asking what was your initial reaction to hearing about Covid when it was spreading and when the lockdown finally happened?

Zack Shaffer: My initial reaction, I mean, I had heard it was spreading before it became big in the U.S., before it was hot and in the news. But so I wasn't surprised to hear of its spreading, but it did come to America a lot quicker and with a lot more force then I think a lot of people were expecting. So I guess I was surprised by how rapid it spread. And when the lockdown was announced, that was actually. Pretty surprising to me that we as a country having lockdowns, which we haven't had in many, many years, if not a century ago, was probably the last time that happened.

Taylor Claybrook: Okay. And can you explain your program at Wayne State?

Zack Shaffer: Yes. So I am an M.D., Ph.D. program, and it's a physician scientist training program where med school and grad school are combined in one. This helps with making it a smoother, shorter process because there is some overlap between med school classes and graduate school classes, especially when you have Ph.D., as in a medical biomedical field. And at the end you graduate with both a M.D. degree and a doctor degree and a. The select few programs and. Yeah. And the goal is to become a physician scientist.

Taylor Claybrook: What? What's your area of study?

Zack Shaffer: My study. Well, my Ph.D. is in physiology with a concentration in reproductive sciences.

Taylor Claybrook: And how has your academic career impacted.

Zack Shaffer: My academic career so the day that the lockdown was announced by Governor Whitmer. Was actually the last day of my first year of medical school, so I had an exam that day. So that was kind of my big focus. And. After that, we were off for a month. The. I was actually planning on starting research between that month between M1. And am too. And unfortunately, I was not able to get as much done as I wanted because of Covid. And then I became a swabber instead. And. With that. The delay, the entrance into M-two was also completely different than online. So that was also changed quite a bit.

Taylor Claybrook: So aside from swabbing people for Covid, what else kept you busy during lockdown?

Zack Shaffer: I went on a lot of walks, a lot of vans. The city streets were fairly empty at the time. So then ambulances and. And I went on a bunch of walks because that was a lot of what there was to do. I also had was living with two people at the time. So we played a lot of board games and video games and we cut together. Yeah, I just just hung out with the few people you allowed to hang out with.

Taylor Claybrook: And what was the transition from in-person to online?

Zack Shaffer: That wasn't too bad, actually. So a lot of the classroom learning of medical school is done online. So most of the lectures that of professors recorded and posted online so that they can be reviewed at a later date. So you no longer have to shop in person for those. And then also, there's a lot of online resources for medical students these days. And those cater actually more to the standardized exams that all medical students have to take to become doctors. So using those resources can help with both school exams and also the large exams that of acquired.

Taylor Claybrook: And then going back in person for your research.

Zack Shaffer: Yeah. So I started my Ph.D. in 2021, and by then they had a relaxed it was enough that we were allowed on campus. There was some points that were wasn't convenient. So like one person to a room, like scattered language days, you come into the lab and of course everyone was wearing masks. But. I definitely slowed down the pace of a lot of people's research because it was difficult to enroll patients and collect data. But. It worked out okay for me.

Taylor Claybrook: What was it like interacting with your family that lived outside of your home.

Zack Shaffer: So my family was at the time all over the country, but none of them live in Michigan. I'm not from Michigan, so I didn't interact with them. For two years. In-person. Just. Just them on the phone. Yeah, just on the phone.

Taylor Claybrook: Okay. So not a lot change. Yeah. So how long have you been in the city and when the lockdown happened?

Zack Shaffer: I moved to Detroit in July of 2019. So I probably been in the city for about nine months. At the time the lockdown happened. And with that, I would say that I got to experience some of what pre-COVID Detroit had to offer, which was very nice.

Taylor Claybrook: And you were all the way into it for a few months when everything happened. But do you wish the school would have done anything differently or do you is there something that you really appreciate about their Covid efforts? And restrictions that they had in place.

Zack Shaffer: I think they did fine. I think. I think nobody I think in hindsight. They nobody know what to do. And. I mean, I think a lot of students got screwed over the ones who had paid to live on campus and then weren't able to live on campus or who got kicked out of their on campus housing. And I think there probably was an increase in suicide rates among students who either were forced back into a home or who lost all the social interaction that kept them sane. But. Mean, it was a global pandemic. So what are you going to do?

Taylor Claybrook: And then the last question I had is where are you now in your MD program?

Zack Shaffer: I am in my. M three year so I've finished the M one and M two years, which are pre-clinical years. I have finished a short Ph.D. so that was three years. The average is usually 4 or 5 years. And now I'm in the hospital at Henry Ford Health Systems. And yeah, I'm just, just doing my clerkships.

Taylor Claybrook: Okay. Those are all the questions that I. Thank you, sir.

Zack Shaffer: Thank you, Taylor.

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Citation

“Zack Shaffer, August 19th, 2024,” Detroit Historical Society Oral History Archive, accessed November 6, 2024, https://oralhistory.detroithistorical.org/items/show/1071.

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