University of Virginia School of Medicine
Curriculum Committee
Minutes 03.23.00

Pediatric Pathology Conference Room, 4:00 pm

Present (underlined) were: Reid Adams, Robert Bloodgood,  Anita Clayton, Al Connors, Gene Corbett, Joanna Goldberg,  Donald Innes (Chair), Steven Meixel, Jerry Short, Rob Williams, Bill Wilson, Debra Reed (Secretary)

1. Don Innes and Al Connors  updated the Committee on the progress of the second year curriculum revisions.  The second year course directors met on 3/21/00 to work on the 2000-01 schedule.  Next year, scheduled class time will be limited to Monday through Friday mornings (8:00 am - noon),  one afternoon per week (1:00 pm-5:00 pm),  and one afternoon per week for the Introduction to Clinical Medicine (Practice of Medicine II) tutorial groups.  The Course Directors will look at alternative teaching methods (e.g. small group, WEB) to accommodate the reduction in scheduled time.    A reduction in course content might not be necessary.
   

   The pros and cons of the decrease in scheduled time were discussed at length. 
   Students often come to class unprepared  because there Ajust isn=t enough time.
   Many students do not attend lectures at all. 
   Fear that unscheduled time will become recreation time.
   Each course director will try to trim one hour from their scheduled time per week and the group will meet again in early April.

2. The creation of faculty positions solely for the purpose of teaching  was debated.  In one sense, it creates two separate Aclasses of citizens@  which might be problematic.  To  retain qualified individuals in such a position, teaching efforts  must be valued as highly as research and clinical duties both financially and for promotion and tenure.   In the current academic medical setting, it might be inevitable and even laudable in that the faculty member would be able to focus on medical education without the time restraints of clinical and research responsibilities.    However, there was concern that the faculty member might become stagnant without the daily clinical/research exposure.

-Don Innes

-DMR