What are Passion Projects?

Written by: Yichen Zeng | Edited by: Arshad Mohammed

Nothing quite encapsulates the spirit and drive of a physician more so than a Passion Project does! To be talented and skilled in that which we’re passionate about is wonderful in itself, but to use those passions and skills to uplift the community around us can often be far more fulfilling and meaningful. And, PMHS’s program for Passion Projects, which exactly utilize your unique set of values, talents, and goals to create a positive impact for the PMHS community and beyond, is perfect for aspiring physicians like us to begin our lifelong careers of altruism first at the local level! 

While investigating how we could promote the awareness and encourage the undertaking of Passion Projects within the PMHS community, I interviewed Meeseo, the coordinator of and advisor for Passion Projects here at PMHS. Alongside her position as an officer of PMHS, Meeseo is currently participating in PMHS’s sole ongoing Passion Project: the Neurodiversity Awareness Project. 

What constitutes a well-designed Passion Project? Well, Meeseo cites Down Syndrome Walk-a-thon, the volunteer campaign that was organized a few years ago to raise funds for Down Syndrome Connection of the Bay Area (a non-profit Down Syndrome organization), as the exemplary Berkeley-student-run philanthropic endeavor. 

For one, Meeseo says, the project was highly accessible, both to the target community and those eager to become involved in operating and expanding this project; for one, the events were run asynchronously, i. e. participants were permitted to film and submit their participation whenever they had the time to. What’s more, while ordinary awareness projects tend to be more unidirectional in the sense that other projects really end at merely hollering into the vast abyss of social media and various political platforms without paying much attention to how the target communities are really benefiting from these projects, Down-to-Walk directly involved the communities it sought to uplift by enabling all participants – students, enthusiastic locals, and individuals with Down Syndrome – to come together for a cause that they cared about and witness the passion and contributions that others had towards their common cause on the project’s social media pages. Indeed, much of this project’s success should also be attributed to how well-advertised the project itself was on various social media platforms. 

More general tips and advice for undertaking a Passion Project would include expecting a lot of logistical work. By “a lot,” Meeseo definitely means a lot: obviously, you have to contact lots of organizations regularly whether it’s to enlist their support or to request favors from them, but being able to connect well with people from all walks of life is no easy feat. Plus, rejections from those whom you contact for support will be common; “not being embarrassed” at rejections is a trait that teams behind any successful project must have, especially with how frequently you’ll be contacting third parties.

Finally, having a wealth of ideas for the directions in which your Passion Project can go would be extremely wise in order for your team to be flexible and accommodating with these third party organizations. 

This transitions really well to tips and advice for those interested in launching their own Passion Projects but don’t quite know where to start. To be flexible and accommodating, you must first know your project – or at the very least what you hope to achieve with your project – inside out. Knowing whom you’d have to contact in order to expand and develop your project is also definitely crucial because they’ll, in the end, be as every part key to your project’s success as your team will be. Time management, as always, is an extremely necessary skill to have, but it’ll only become more necessary once you’re working with outside parties whose schedules won’t be as open to changes as a student’s might be. 

But what if you don’t even know what exactly you hope to achieve with a Passion Project? Of course, that doesn’t mean that you can’t start brainstorming for ways to uplift your local community. As Meeseo advises, start by writing down ideas of what you’d like to accomplish – and you’re welcome to be as vague as you’d like! This is mainly so that you don’t forget about these ideas later, once you’ve compiled a list of decent size and begin deliberating over your next steps. Go through this list of ideas regularly to update them based on whatever new knowledge or insights you gain on their feasibility, necessity, or simply their appeal to you. Eventually, you’ll stumble across an idea that fits your interests and passions to a T, and from there, your Passion Project will germinate.