Meet Joe Kim, Class of 2015

Friday, May 8, 2015

Joe Kim
Pre-Medicine and Music major
Wilmette, Illinois

Joe KimWhen Joe Kim sees a need, he searches for ways to meet that need. Usually, he finds one. When he arrived at the University of Iowa, for instance, the school had no Special Olympics chapter—so he founded one. He plays guitar for patients at Mercy Hospital’s psychiatric unit and was a songwriting facilitator for inmates at Oakdale Prison. Having completed his music and pre-med studies in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, Kim will now pursue a Master’s in Health Administration from the UI College of Public Health. He hopes to one day lead a team of physicians at a clinic equipped to serve patients with special needs. It’s an ambitious goal. Fortunately, Kim is exceptionally good at creating ways to give.

Why are you glad you came to Iowa?

The University of Iowa has so many different majors and extra curriculars and opportunities to get involved and find yourself and how you can best serve others. Looking back, I really can’t imagine myself anywhere else. This university has really catered to all that I could have asked for and more.

What was your best moment here?

Last semester, I had the honor of being on the Homecoming court with 11 other fantastic, phenomenal seniors. For the Homecoming game against Indiana, we got to walk out onto Kinnick Stadium on the 50 yard line. The crowd was packed and my family and friends were in the stands. It was definitely a moment that I won’t forget.

If you could speak to yourself as an incoming freshman, what advice would you give yourself?

If I could speak to myself as an incoming freshman, I would definitely tell myself to live in the moment. I think in this day and age there’s so much pressure and competition that you need to know exactly what you’re doing, you need to be on this expedited fast track and know where you’re headed and have a Plan A, B, C, and D…and that’s great, to know where you’re going or where you want to be and have dreams and goals and visions. I think that’s really important. But at the same time, I would tell myself, don’t be so focused on that that you forget to take a breath and relax, enjoy the moment, and just cherish it and take it all in.

Where do you hope to be in 10 years?

In 10 years, I hope to be a director or open up my own clinic and lead a team of physicians and health care professionals that have a special interest working with the special needs population. Working with that group has been a passion of mine since high school and that carried through in my college career. And so I really want to be able to lead that group and knowing the ways that I can best serve that population, I just feel that I want to make sure that we have health care and programs that can best cater to them.

—Interview by Nora Heaton (BA 2013) and Dora Grote (Class of 2015); photo by Jill Tobin

The University of Iowa College of Liberal Arts and Sciences offers about 70 majors across the humanities; fine, performing and literary arts; natural and mathematical sciences; social and behavioral sciences; and communication disciplines. About 15,000 undergraduate and nearly 2,000 graduate students study each year in the college’s 37 departments, led by faculty at the forefront of teaching and research in their disciplines. The college teaches all Iowa undergraduates through the college's general education program, CLAS CORE. About 80 percent of all Iowa undergraduates begin their academic journey in CLAS. The college confers about 60 percent of the university's bachelor's degrees each academic year.