Professional Skills Development
Medical schools have different processes for evaluating applications. In addition to academics accomplishment, they also look for intangible qualities that distinguish applicants. Applicants to medical school should be able to demonstrate leadership, communications skills, planning and time management, and self-directed active learning. The Medical Postbac Program Professional Development gives the students the tools to develop the essential skills that make them competitive applicants to medical school.
Learning Styles and ToolKits
Students will first explore their learning styles by participating in a skills inventory. Everyone learns best when information is presented in a manner that matches their best learning method. Most students will learn their best style or styles for the first time and how to take advantage of these unique learning modalities. Whether logical, visual, aural, verbal, or kinesthetic learners, appropriate tool kits will help students become more proficient at recalling and processing learning. This process of identifying and cultivating the learning styles and the toolkits that support them will be presented and utilized throughout the curriculum.
Time Management
Students will be aided in their time management usage by exposure to techniques designed to improve personal time management. Identifying time utilization and time wasters will be discussed and added to students’ repertoires as they develop their personal time planning guides.
Interview Preparation
Interview practice will be facilitated by the staff with years of experience in interviewing medical school applicants. Preparation will include practice questions, formal interview sessions to create the same surroundings/realism of the actual interview, and feedback with constructive comments to improve performance.
Personality Styles
Understanding one's personality style and how that relates to others through communication enhances the ability to establish rapport and create a richer dialogue. Successful communication delivers a message that the listener will receive and acknowledge. Learning about themselves and those around them regarding personality styles will help students communicate more effectively.
Written Communications
Students will practice writing their statements when completing the application to medical school. The goal is to improve their statements to make the best first impression on the reviewers of the medical schools’ Admissions Committee.
Brainstorming
The objective of the Brainstorming section is to instill in students an effective way to generate many ideas on specific issues and then to determine which idea, or group of ideas, provides the best solution. Students realize the synergistic effects of brainstorming by using a rigorous process to elicit new and creative ideas creating an inclusive environment.
Teamwork and Collaboration
Each group will be given projects that require collaboration and cooperation to complete successfully. Multiple approaches will be demonstrated, and then projects will be assigned in which students must organize, assign roles and deliver products within short timeframes. Evaluations and debriefing will reaffirm and critique the techniques.
Initiative
Students will be exposed to problems and exercises that stretch their concepts and comfort zones. Creative thinking and examination of all aspects of a problem are hallmarks of outstanding clinicians. Students will be exposed to multiple alternatives within various problems by breaking the rules that hinder creative thinking.