If you call in to the local pharmacy in Barham for a prescription or pharmaceutical advice, it is more than likely you will have your queries answered or your medication dispensed by friendly young pharmacist, Emily Jones.
Emily is a local girl who studied pharmacy at La Trobe University in Bendigo and has been working part-time in the Barham pharmacy since she was in her final year of high school. She started working behind the counter as a general staff member and gradually assumed more responsibility as she progressed through her four-year course.
Since she was a young girl, Emily has wanted to do something in the science field. Her father was an agronomist, so science was part of her upbringing. When she was at high school, Emily wanted to study bio-medical engineering – the science of building new organs. At the end of that year, she realised that she would have to move to Melbourne to pursue that career path as there were no local jobs in that field. She discounted medicine early on and decided to study pharmacy.
Emily said that the teachers at the local high school were very accommodating. In a Year 12 class of only 12 students, she was the only one who wanted to take chemistry, physics and biology. In fact, she was the only one who studied physics and chemistry and she was able to do these subjects at school as opposed to doing them at another school or by remote learning.
At the end of 2020, Emily graduated from university. In her final year, because of the COVID-19 restrictions, she was able to listen to her lectures online and worked full-time at the pharmacy. The following year, she did her internship there, and is now a full-time pharmacist. She works from 9.00am to 5.30pm each day and every second Saturday morning. She has recently done a course in administering vaccines.
A lot of students, she says, just assume that they’re disadvantaged by coming from a small rural town, but Emily sees it as a positive. “The teachers,” she says, “go over and beyond, and you don’t get that at a big school.”
She says that in her job, she has to talk to a lot of customers, and she feels that a lot of the young city people she has met don’t have that same ability to interact with the public. “Coming from a small rural town, you know everybody. You see them down the street and you are building skills that you will use in your everyday life dealing with people.”
In her spare time, Emily and her fiancé go clay target shooting, and she watches him play football. The couple was fortunate to have recently finished building their house and are planning a September wedding.