Back to News ReleasesCONTACT: Jennifer Forbes
Communications & Public Affairs
732-235-6356, jenn.forbes@umdnj.edu
Encouraging New Brunswick-area Youth to Pursue the “S” in STEM 
Each summer, in a host of medical school classrooms known as the Kessler Teaching Labs, nearly 85 of New Brunswick’s youth get the opportunity to see real human organs and are introduced to science and medicine topics that go well beyond the lessons learned in high school biology. The teenagers listened intently as medical students, members of Robert Wood Johnson Medical School’s Homeless and Indigent Population Health Outreach Project, or HIPHOP, explain, in detail, the difference between the frontal lobe and the temporal lobe of the brain; what a diseased lung looks like after years of tobacco use, and the devastating, long-term effects of HIV and Aids.
In its twelfth year, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School welcomed teenagers from the HUB Teen Center and PRAB in New Brunswick, and the Simuel Whitfield Simmons Organization (SWS) in Somerset. The students participated in interactive sessions in which the medical students encouraged questions and invoked curiosity about the human body, biomedical research and the personal benefit gained from improving the lives of patients.
Although the program focuses mostly on science and health careers, the medical students also discussed higher education requirements for a variety of professions, along with financial aid opportunities that allow anyone who wants to pursue an advanced degree to do so. Throughout the day-long event, the medical students also underscore the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle through good eating habits and exercising. At the end of the day, the medical students tested the teenagers’ recently-gained knowledge through a Jeopardy-like competition.
HIPHOP is a comprehensive, student-run health delivery organization that provides primary care, patient education and psychiatric services to adults who have limited access to medical care. The students in HIPHOP, who include medical students, physician assistant students and public health students, participate in more than 30 outreach projects in central New Jersey that focus on health maintenance and disease prevention.
For more information about HIPHOP visit: http://rwjms.rutgers.edu/community_health/hiphop.html or contact Susan Giordano, program coordinator.
About Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School
As one of the nation's leading comprehensive medical schools, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, part of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is dedicated to the pursuit of excellence in education, research, health care delivery, and the promotion of community health. In cooperation with Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, the medical school's principal affiliate, they comprise New Jersey's premier academic medical center. In addition, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School has 34 other hospital affiliates and ambulatory care sites throughout the region.
Robert Wood Johnson Medical School encompasses 20 basic science and clinical departments, and hosts centers and institutes including The Cardiovascular Institute, the Child Health Institute of New Jersey, the Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine, the Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences Institute, and the Stem Cell Institute of New Jersey. The medical school maintains educational programs at the undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate levels for more than 1,500 students on its campuses in New Brunswick and Piscataway, and provides continuing education courses for health care professionals and community education programs. To learn more about Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, visit rwjms.rutgers.edu. Find us online at facebook.com/RWJMedicalSchool and twitter.com/RWJMS.
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