MU School of Medicine to Award 98 Degrees at Commencement Ceremony

The University of Missouri School of Medicine will celebrate the graduation of 98 medical students in the class of 2018 at 11:30 a.m. Saturday, May 12, in Jesse Auditorium, 205 Jesse Hall.

This year’s graduating class includes the first graduates to train at the Springfield Clinical Campus. Nine graduates spent the last two years of their medical education in southwest Missouri. The Springfield Clinical Campus is a public/private partnership with MU and CoxHealth and Mercy hospitals.

This year’s commencement speaker is Debra Howenstine, MD, associate professor of family and community medicine at the MU School of Medicine.

The class of 2018 had a 99 percent residency program match rate, meaning many hospitals and health systems chose graduating MU medical school graduates as their top resident physician candidates.

After receiving their medical degrees on Saturday, these physicians will go on to receive additional training in their chosen specialties. Many of the physicians – 27 percent of MU School of Medicine’s class of 2018 – will remain on the MU campus for their residency training. Thirty-nine percent of the MU School of Medicine 2018 class will remain in Missouri, and 41 percent of this graduating class selected residency programs in high-need primary care fields, including internal medicine, pediatrics and family medicine.

Graduates of the MU School of Medicine consistently score higher than the national average on the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE). MU School of Medicine graduates are trained, evaluated and expected to be competent in their ability to deliver patient-centered care, including their capability to communicate with the patient, family members and colleagues working as part of an interdisciplinary team.

To watch a livestream of the ceremony, visit http://Livestream.com/mizzou/schoolofmedicine2018.