Learner Profile
Jorge Arnez Gonzales

School

The American International School of Bolivia

HMX Courses

Pharmacology, Physiology

A student in the international baccalaureate (IB) program at The American International School of Bolivia, Jorge Arnez Gonzales has plans to pursue a career as a physician. He took HMX courses to augment his current study in high school, as well as to prepare for the academic challenges ahead.

For chemistry, one of the options that my class is choosing is medicinal chemistry, so I thought it would not hurt to take pharmacology. For physiology, the same thing but with my biology class, the option we’re choosing as a class is human physiology. So I just wanted to have an introduction to what that would be so I would be more prepared for the exam.

Also there are a lot of medical students here in Bolivia, and they told me the class they struggled with most was pharmacology. So I wanted to be ready for the worst of what they told me. But I actually enjoyed the course; out of the two I would say pharmacology was my favorite.

What I enjoyed was that it was complete in the sense that it gave you background knowledge; there was this tool even before going into the basics that told you the background information you’d need to know in order to excel in the lesson. So I thought that was a great tool.

I enjoyed the clinical application of it most, but I realized that before going into the clinical setting, I need to understand the background, which is the drawings. I thought they were very clear, but I enjoyed having the ability to see how what I had learned is relevant in a clinical scenario. I understood some topics better through the application with real people, because it’s different to see in real life than on just paper or drawings.

I think the structure was really logical; you’ve first got the concept videos, then the application, and then you take the review. That really helped me because it’s step by step, you don’t just get all the information at once – it’s like building blocks. And then you have learned everything you need about the lesson. So I think the way it’s structured was really helpful.

It was challenging at the beginning, because this is the first online course I’ve taken, so I had to be a little bit more disciplined in order to complete the lessons. But in regards to material I have to say it’s challenging because I had to learn more technical terms over a short period of time in comparison to what I have to learn at school. But once I got used to the rhythm of learning key terms every single video, it got easier.

Yes, I see myself taking other courses because it helped me boost my knowledge beyond what school is going to teach me.