Dear Colleagues,
The last month has been an exciting one for the MU School of Medicine. On Match Day, our fourth-year medical students learned where they will be living and learning for the next several years during their residencies. This is the second Match Day that I’ve been able to witness here at MU, and it is an emotional day as our students celebrate the tangible accomplishment of their medical education when they open their sealed envelopes to reveal their futures.
This year, we had a 97% match rate – up from 96% last year – which speaks very highly to the medical education we provide. More than 40% of the class of 2023 will remain in Missouri for their residencies and 36% of the class selected residency programs in high-need care fields.
It was great attending Match Day festivities and celebrating with our medical students. I love getting to interact with our students and our potential new candidates for School of Medicine admissions. During our “Second Look,” students in our class of 2027 visit Mizzou to get to know us better as they decide whether to accept our invitation to attend our medical school.
It is the circle of medical education: as we prepare to say farewell to our fourth-year students, we say welcome to our first-year students.
While we celebrated our fourth-year and incoming students, we recently recognized the impact our educators have on students. Each year, 28 students in our third-year class move to southwest Missouri to receive hands-on medical education at our Springfield Clinical Campus. Our School of Medicine recently was able to honor our Springfield area physicians who volunteer their time to mentor and teach our medical students.
Under the guidance of 14 associate clerkship directors at Mercy Health and Cox Health, the medical students rotate through core areas of medicine during their third year, and electives during their fourth and final year. More than 400 physicians at Mercy and Cox serve as faculty for the Springfield Clinical Campus. Our students speak very highly of their time with Cox and Mercy physicians. Learn more about their experiences and the faculty appreciation dinner.
While we were recently able to honor our educators in Springfield, we were also able to recognize some of our most profound educators – our patients – during the Legacy Teachers luncheon. In its 18th year, the Legacy Teachers program honors patients who inspired and provided important lessons to third-year medical students.
Yesterday, we hosted our Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) kick-off event. The LCME is the accrediting body for programs granting Doctor of Medicine degrees in the U.S. and Canada. Our LCME accreditation is a voluntary, peer-review process that fosters institutional and programmatic improvement. We are committed to maintaining our school’s longstanding tradition of educational excellence and an outstanding educational experience for our students. Thank you to everyone who is setting the stage for another successful accreditation.
We are in an exciting time for our medical school. Kudos to everyone who is playing a role in our shared success!
Sincerely,
Richard Barohn, MD
Executive Vice Chancellor for Health Affairs
University of Missouri
rbarohn@health.missouri.edu
