Kira Zwygart MD, FAAFP

Associate Dean, Student Affairs

Deborah DeWaay MD, FACP

Associate Dean, UME

Introducing the new faces in Student Affairs...

Dr. Dosani, Assistant Director of Wellness

In this section we share changes made based on your feedback!

Student Study Room Reservations Guidelines

All “MCOM Quiet Student Study” spaces are reserved on floors 4 and 5 between the hours of 7am-5:20pm for all MCOM students for individual quiet study. The Department of Medical Education (DME) reserves the study space throughout each week in MDD and posts the reservation schedules on the monitors on floor 2 and on the hubs by the elevators.

Please note: Individual students are not allowed to reserve rooms in MDD for student study. If a room is not scheduled for an event, students should feel free to use that space as a study space. No reservation is required. However, if a future reserved event is scheduled for that room, students not associated with that event must leave 10 minutes prior to the event’s reservation’s start. Student groups and clubs are permitted to reserve MDD space for events and meetings.

Dr. DeWaay Office Hours

Dr. DeWaay will be hanging out during the following dates and times. Feel free to come say hi and chat. If you are on the USF-LV campus, unable to attend, or have a topic that requires more privacy please don’t hesitate to email dewaay@usf.edu to make an appointment with Dr. DeWaay.

Room MDD 318

September 12: 3:45pm-5:15pm

October 9: 12pm-1:30pm

November17: 12pm-1:30pm

White Coat Ceremony - August 31st at 6pm-8pm

This will take place at the Tampa Convention Center. Click here for more information.

Please invite your loved ones to stop by for the Family Information Session that afternoon prior to the big event! 

• SELECT family session starts at 3pm in MDD 230
• Core+SELECT family session starts at 3:30pm in MDD 240

*Required rehearsal will take place Wed Aug 30th at 5:30pm at the Tampa Convention Center.

Gallery of Specialties - October 9th and 19th

The Gallery of Specialties is a great way to meet with leadership from various specialties to gain insights and ask questions. This year we will have a Gallery of Specialties on both the Tampa and LV campuses. More details will be sent in the coming weeks.

Tampa-campus: Oct 9th 5:30pm-8pm

LV-campus: Oct 19th 5:30pm-8pm

ALL STUDENTS

Disability Insurance Requirement

As you start a new academic year, it is time to submit your annual mandatory disability insurance. Disabling accidents and illnesses can happen at any time, to anyone. With tuition costs and limited income, it is important to have the ability to be financially assisted if a disability prevents you from continuing your medical education. USF requires coverage and we partner with The Standard Insurance company to provide comprehensive coverage for you as medical students. 

For more information about your disability insurance coverage, please click: here and ENTER ID: 644213

For the academic year 2023-2024, you may pay online using the instructions below.

Instructions for online disability payment: 

Step 1: Click HERE to an external site, Pick September 8 as the date.

Step 2: Under the Qty. dropdown select 1, then select continue.

Step 3: Add your name to " Name on Ticket (Optional)"

Step 4: Please complete all sections until the end. (all fields must be answered)

Step 5: Review your information and Pay for your ticket

You must pay the amount of $72.96 by September 8, 2023. 

Service Learning and Teaching Graduation Requirement

The requirements for graduation are articulated in the MD Student Handbook. Item number 6 broadly describes the 'Service Learning and Teaching Graduation' requirement. Please review page 40 of the MD Student Handbook, and click here for more detailed information

If you have questions please email Ms. Shirley Smith, shirleys@usf.edu

Class of 2027 - Core

    8/28 – Course 1 Test 1 Exam

    9/11 – Course 1 Test 2 Exam

    9/25 – C1 Anatomy Lab Practical

    9/27 – Course 1 Test 3 Exam

    9/29 – Course 1 NBME

Class of 2026 - Core

    9/6 – Course 5 Test 2 Exam

    9/18 – Course 5 Test 3 Exam

    9/21 – Course 5 NBME

Class of 2025 - Core

    8/24 – Neurology NBME Exam

    8/25 – Surgical NBME Exam

    8/25 – Psychiatry NBME Exam

    8/25 – Surgical Gyn (ES) Exam

    9/21 – Obstetrics NBME Exam

    9/22 – Primary Care NBME Exam

    9/22 – Medicine NBME Exam

    9/22 – Pediatrics NBME Exam

Class of 2025 - SELECT

    8/24 – Psychiatry NBME Exam

    8/24 – Obstetrics NBME Exam

    8/25 – Medicine NBME Exam

    8/25 – Surgical NBME Exam

    8/25 – Neurology NBME Exam

    8/25 – Pediatrics NBME Exam

Complete Mandatory End of Year Surveys in one45

This is a friendly reminder to complete your End of Year Survey. The survey was administered through one45 and can be found in your To Dos List. Please note, this is a mandatory survey. You can only opt out of it if you are returning from an annual leave of absence.

In order to better serve you, please email evalsupport@usf.edu with any inquiries/issues. The Evaluation Team will review your correspondence and will work to resolve your inquiries/issues in a timely manner.

Click here for more info. We appreciate you taking the time to do this. Your input will greatly improve our ability to prioritize future programmatic improvements for the college!

You will have to attend a mandatory evaluation session if you do not complete your survey. Complete your survey to avoid going to detention! 😊

Reminders

• Accept your invitation to the Financial Aid Fundamentals & Debt Management Course 
• Ensure that all notifications are on to not miss important financial aid and debt management information

Debt Reduction Scholarship Challenge Starts Sept 4th

Participate for your chance to win $500 each month to pay directly toward your federal student loans! *Students with no loan debt can still participate for funds to be applied to future educational expenses. Participation is OPTIONAL! 

Covid Requirements

If a student tests positive for COVID-19, they must stay home for at least 5 days and isolate from others away from campus.

USF-LV campus: All positive tests must be reported to employee health.

Students isolating off campus:

• Wear a high-quality mask if you must be around others at home and in public.
• Do not go places where you are unable to wear a mask.
• Do not travel
• Stay home and separate from others as much as possible.
• Use a separate bathroom, if possible.
• Stay in well-ventilated areas of their house or apartment.
• Don’t share personal household items.
• Monitor symptoms and if they develop difficulty breathing they should seek additional medical treatment at SHWC or an Emergency room

There is NO NEED TO RETEST FOR COVID in order to end isolation. 

USF-LV Campus only: you will need to wear a N95 mask at work and in the DOE through day 10.

Future of Healthcare Survey - Optional

It will take less than 5 minutes to complete this IRB-approved research study to obtain a basic understanding of the outlook medical students have regarding the future of health care. As future physicians, your perspective on the future of our profession and our collective well-being is important to understand at this early stage in our careers.

Please answer as openly and honestly as possible, and refrain from discussing with your peers prior to responding so that we minimize the risk of “group think bias”. Responses will be held confidentially and will only be shared in aggregate form without any identifying information. We do ask that you voluntarily identify your medical school (optional), so that medical school-specific information can be shared in aggregate with your school’s Dean’s office.

If you have any questions about this research, please contact the primary investigator, Shu Lin by calling 917-843-0039 or emailing sl2034@mynsu.nova.edu. If you have questions about the study and want to talk to someone who is not part of the study, you can call the Nova Southeastern University Institutional Review Board (IRB) at (954) 262-5369 or toll free at 1-866-499-0790 or email at IRB@nova.edu.

Intramural Sports Registration Now Open

The opening of the registration window for the first set of intramural sports is Wed, August 23rd. The first set of sports are volleyball and 6v6 soccer, which have co-rec, men’s, and women’s leagues. Additionally, there is League of Legends if you are interested in e-sports. 

If you’d like to participate in any of these sports, please email or text Jonathan Henning, the class of 2026 Intramural Chair. He will do his best to create teams based on interest. Also, if you want a particular league (co-rec, men’s, women’s), let him know so he can arrange that.

Jon's contact info: jhenning1@usf.edu | (914) 806-0786

E-Scooters are Prohibited from Being Inside USF Buildings

The RIME Framework: Tracking Student Progress in Medical Education

The RIME framework, used widely in clerkships nationwide, helps describe medical students' professional development. Students, residents, and faculty can all employ it to gauge progress and offer feedback.

The framework, developed by Dr. Louis Pangaro, defines four stages of student development: Reporter, Interpreter, Manager, and Educator. As students advance, they move through these stages by integrating knowledge, skills, and attitudes:

1. Reporter: Collects and communicates patient information effectively. Expected for all students by clerkship's end.
2. Interpreter: Independently identifies and prioritizes problems, develops differential diagnoses, and defends them.
3. Manager: Formulates diagnostic and therapeutic plans, using clinical judgment and risk/benefit analysis.
4. Educator: Masters previous skills, conducts in-depth research, and shares knowledge with the team.

This framework offers a structured way to understand student growth. Students can track progress, and faculty can provide feedback for continual improvement.

A student's RIME level can be influenced by factors like patient complexity and rotation specialization. For instance, a student could function as a manager for outpatient community-acquired pneumonia but as a reporter in the neonatal ICU. Thus, faculty-assigned RIME levels reflect encounters within their clinical context, leading to variation among instructors. Think of it like a child described as "able to read" at age 6 but struggling with a seventh-grade book. Comprehensive grading encompasses more than just overall RIME level since it's a developmental model, capturing one aspect of a student's work. All clinical assessments are inherently qualitative. RIME is used because it is a framework that has been studied and adopted at multiple institutions.

Show Me DeWaay...

Having trouble focusing? Use the Pomodoro Technique, conceived by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s, is a time management approach. It involves using a timer to segment work into 25-minute intervals, known as pomodoros, interspersed with short breaks. The term "pomodoro" stems from the Italian word for tomato, as Cirillo initially used a tomato-shaped timer when he developed the technique. There are apps you can use, but the timer on your phone is fine.

The method involves six sequential actions:

All past issues can now be found at the bottom of the Helpful Links page (that is on you QR Code cards)!