It took many setbacks and sacrifices for Jayden to become a Deakin medical student but he kept going, driven by a desire to help others feel at home in his rural community.
Growing up in a country town, Jayden Robertson longed for access to medical professionals who understood what he was going through as he struggled with his sexuality and being neurodivergent. He decided it was a gap he could fill for others by becoming a doctor himself.
‘I’ve experienced firsthand the difficulties of growing up with uncertainty about who you are, who you are to other people, and the community’s perception of who you are as a person,’ the Deakin University medical student says.
‘I wish when I was a teenager I could have had a professional to talk to, not just a psychologist or therapist, but someone who could help with problems that required a doctor or specialist.’
As he grew up, that wish became a goal. When he had to select what he’d study in the final years of high school, Jayden chose biology, chemistry and psychology – subjects that became the foundation of his continuing passion for how human bodies work.
The first hurdle in his path to medicine came early, when his Year 12 results weren’t high enough to secure a place in an undergraduate medical degree. After a gap year spent working at the local supermarket and pizza shop, Jayden began a degree in Biomedical Science at Deakin
Finding a way around the obstacles
In hindsight, he says, missing out on an undergraduate medical degree was a blessing in disguise.
‘I learnt, grew and matured so much during that time at Deakin. I lived on residence at the Waurn Ponds Campus for the first two years, making many lifelong friends and memories, both happy and sad.’
After graduating, Jayden unsuccessfully applied for a position in the Rural Training Scheme in Deakin’s School of Medicine. Undeterred, he took a job at Clinical Labs in Geelong instead.
‘I made many more friends and learnt an incredible amount from being inquisitive and building rapport with scientists and managers alike. That led me to my second attempt to enter the Rural Training Scheme.’
This time, Jayden’s application was accepted.
Training rural doctors for rural communities
Australia’s regional and rural communities are short on doctors and medical professionals in general. Country students who want to become doctors face extra barriers to studying medicine compared to their city counterparts, and their communities struggle to attract and retain doctors who want to live and work in regional areas.
Local and international evidence shows that students from rural backgrounds who complete extended training in a rural clinical school are more likely to work in rural areas after graduation, while other evidence suggests the best outcomes happen when students from rural communities can complete their training in their own region.
Deakin’s Rural Training Scheme, established in 2022, aims to grow the medical workforce in regional areas and remove some of the barriers to entry for rural students who want to study medicine. Each year, around 30 domestic places in Deakin’s Doctor of Medicine are held for applicants applying through the Rural Training Scheme. Clinical training places at Deakin’s Rural Clinical Schools are available so students can remain living in rural areas while completing their training.
Smoothing the path to rural practice
But gaining a place to study medicine isn’t the end of the journey. For Jayden, there were still many financial and personal challenges ahead.
‘Coming from a rural town, you can imagine that I don’t come from a lot of money – which is completely true,’ Jayden says candidly.
‘I’ve had to learn to fend for myself, working, renting and trying my hardest to save money. While the work I’ve done has been fulfilling and brought me a lot of enjoyment, they weren’t well paid positions. I was able to save just enough to survive without having to work for a little while, but it wouldn’t last forever.’
Fortunately, many members of Deakin’s donor community also have an interest in supporting rural medical students to achieve their dreams of practicing medicine in their own communities.
Jayden is now a recipient of the Deakin PSA Insurance Rural Doctor Scholarship, created and supported by Victorian Medical Insurance Agency Limited (VMIAL) to transform opportunities for doctors to change lives across rural Victoria and Australia. VMIAL has invested in the futures of 37 Deakin medical students through scholarships since 2016.
Keeping the end goal in sight
‘When I discovered I had received the scholarship it was like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders,’ Jayden says.
‘I immediately called mum to let her know the good news and we both knew life had just been made a little bit easier.
‘The scholarship means I won’t have to work as frequently in addition to study, allowing me to focus on what’s important – learning, growing and becoming the best possible medical practitioner I can be. It gives me the opportunity to be less stressed and worried about how I’m going to pay my next bill, how I’m going to afford food, or how I’m going to pay for tools that will help me unlock the potential I have to be the best medical student I can afford to be.
‘I’d like to say massive thank you to VMIAL. Because of their generosity, I now have the ability to undertake medicine with less financial worry in my mind – and I can focus on what is most important – becoming a rural doctor and helping those in need.’
Because through all the setbacks and hurdles Jayden has overcome to get to this point, his goal has remained clear.
‘That wish for my teenage self to have someone in the medical profession I could talk to is one of the main driving factors I want to give back to my rural town – a place for youth and people in general to feel safe, secure and comfortable in their own bodies and places they live,’ he says.
‘I want to help as many people as possible to live their best lives. With the opportunity to learn medicine, I’ll be able to advocate for the health and wellbeing of those whose voices can oftentimes go unheard.’