background image
Robert Wood Johnson Medical School
3
Education:
C u l t i v a t i n g p a t i e n t - c e n t e r e d
p h y s i c i a n s t h r o u g h s y s t e m s - b a s e d
l e a r n i n g .
T
he school-wide objectives for
the medical educational
program are modeled after the
ACGME (Accreditation Commit-
tee for Graduate Medical
Education) Competencies
,
encompassing the six core com-
petencies:
Patient Care
,
Medical
Knowledge
,
Practice-based
Learning and Improvement
,
Interpersonal and Communica-
tion Skills
,
Professionalism and
Systems-based Practice
.
The curriculum for medical stu-
dents is a four-year model with a
fully integrated, systems-based
curriculum for the first two (pre-
clerkship) years; core clerkships
(medicine, surgery, pediatrics,
obstetrics and gynecology,
psychiatry, neurology, and family
medicine) and five weeks of
elective time in the third year;
and core clerkships in emergency
medicine, adult or pediatric critical
care, a sub-internship, a two-week
specialty boot camp and electives
in the fourth year.
The first two years of medical
school are spent on the
Piscataway campus
, where
clinical skills and basic science
concepts are learned during
lectures, as well as in 26 state-of-
the-art small group teaching
rooms known as the
Kessler
Teaching Labs
. It is in this
environment that efficient and
effective lifelong learning skills are
developed for a successful career
in medicine. Highlights of the
preclerkship curriculum include
the longitudinal learning
experience of Patient Centered
Medicine, early immersion into
clinical skills testing, service
learning opportunities and a rich
co-curricular environment of
student-run electives and interest
groups.
Students at
Robert Wood
Johnson Medical School
complete the third and fourth
years at clinical campuses in either
New Brunswick
at
Robert Wood
Johnson University Hospital
, the
school's principal teaching affiliate,
or at other affiliated medical
centers in New Jersey, including
the
University Medical Center of
Princeton at Plainsboro
,
Saint
Peter's University Hospital
, and
Jersey Shore University Medical
Center
. In addition, a new clerk-
ship curriculum is rolling out at
the
Somerset Campus
of
Robert
Wood Johnson University
Hospital
. These fast-paced
teaching hospitals provide unique
opportunities to learn and
participate in diagnostic evalua-
tions, treatment modalities and
community outreach.
The required
Independent
Student Project
challenges
students to identify an area of
interest related to one of the
pillars of the school:
research
,
education
,
service to the
community
or
patient care
.
The development of the project
spans all four years and
culminates in scholarship.
Students graduate with a mini
area of expertise and the
beginnings of an academic
focus.
With nearly 650 students, the medical school aspires
to excellence across the education continuum: under-
graduate medical education; graduate medical educa-
tion; and continuing medical education. The medical
school strives to develop clinically proficient, cultur-
ally competent, compassionate and humanistic physi-
cians, dedicated to inquiry and discovery, service and
advocacy, humanism and professionalism.