Nutrition Student of the Month - Ryan Kluck - Byrdine F. Lewis College of Nursing and Health Professions

Where are you from
Marietta, GA
Why did you choose to study nutrition? Was there a specific person, experience, or event that sparked your interest?
I was obese from as early as 7 years old until my early 20’s. I learned about exercise and nutrition by trial and error for years, and developed a better lifestyle from these experiences. I lost over 100lbs over the course of a few years. I really didn’t become interested in nutrition as a career path until after I hired a personal trainer to help me gain more lean mass. At the time, I did not know that the trainer was unqualified to offer dietary counselling, and I listened blindly. I became underweight, malnourished, tired, weak, and felt sick. I developed an eating disorder and suffer from body dysmorphia, both of which I continue to work on and address to this day.

I never want anyone to experience what I endured. That is why I am interested in nutrition. While my interest in nutrition leans more towards cardiovascular health in pediatrics, especially for children who have heart defects, I can empathize and better understand people who struggle to lose weight or gain weight.
What nutrition program were you a part of at GSU? What made you choose your program?
Nutrition, B.S. The program held more weight on it’s sciences than other programs, which was part of my needing to better understand nutrition.
What was your favorite thing about the nutrition program? What were some of your biggest takeaways?
The professors were my favorite part of the program. They all genuinely wanted us to succeed, and were always open to answering any questions.
What has your career looked like since you graduated? Tell us about the jobs you have had or currently have.
I currently work at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta at the Scottish Rite campus as the senior human milk technician. It is a new program to Children’s that will be expanding to Egleston later this year. The large end goal is to train the staff at Egleston in preparation for the new human milk room being built in Children’s newest campus, currently in construction. When the campus opens, the team should transition into the new building, trained and ready to go on day 1.

What I do is I work alongside our dietitians to calculate and process new feed orders for babies. I, alongside our other human milk techs, prepare feeds for baby- whether they are tube fed, or bottle fed. We are the ones responsible for creating those orders, fortifying mom’s milk, and sending them up to our nurses.
What other passions do you have? Has studying nutrition helped you realize or grow these passions?
I really enjoy practicing the guitar. I’m not good at all yet, but it’s been lots of fun and I continue to grow in skill.
If you could give advice to someone considering studying nutrition, what advice would you give them?
The field of nutrition is vast. There are careers in not just clinical, but community, food service, sports nutrition, food science and research, to name a few. If you know you want to pursue nutrition, but don’t quite know where you’d like to focus your attention on, GSU introduces many different paths to you during their program.

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