SOM Accreditation
Challenges, 2019-2020 & 2023
Elements with Finding Resulting from the 2020 accreditation visit
Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) accreditation uses a framework that consists of 12 standards, with each comprised of a varying number of elements. This framework addresses the Department of Education's recognition requirement of a "two-year limit for accredited institutions and programs to achieve compliance with accreditation standards," and allows for compliance with a standard even if there are unsatisfactory findings for individual elements. Below is the list of elements for which the School of Medicine had a finding during the most recent full survey visit in February 2020.
Element | Element Description | Initial Finding |
5.11 | Study/Lounge/Storage Space/Call Rooms A medical school ensures that its medical students have, at each campus and affiliated clinical site, adequate study space, lounge areas, personal lockers or other secure storage facilities, and secure call rooms if students are required to participate in late night or overnight clinical learning experiences. | Satisfactory with a Need for Monitoring |
8.5 | Medical Student Feedback In evaluating medical education program quality, a medical school has formal processes in place to collect and consider medical student evaluations of their courses, clerkships, and teachers, and other relevant information. | Satisfactory with a Need for Monitoring |
12.4 | Student Access to Health Care Services A medical school provides its medical students with timely access to needed diagnostic, preventive, and therapeutic health services at sites in reasonable proximity to the locations of their required educational experiences and has policies and procedures in place that permit students to be excused from these experiences to seek needed care. | Satisfactory with a Need for Monitoring |
1.3 | Mechanisms for Faculty Participation A medical school ensures that there are effective mechanisms in place for direct faculty participation in decision-making related to the medical education program, including opportunities for faculty participation in discussions about, and the establishment of, policies and procedures for the program, as appropriate. | Unsatisfactory |
6.2 | Required Clinical Experiences The faculty of a medical school define the types of patients and clinical conditions that medical students are required to encounter, the skills to be performed by medical students, the appropriate clinical settings for these experiences, and the expected levels of medical student responsibility. | Unsatisfactory |
6.3 | Self-Directed and Life-Long Learning The faculty of a medical school ensure that the medical curriculum includes self-directed learning experiences that allow medical students to develop the skills of lifelong learning. Self-directed learning involves medical students' self-assessment of learning needs; independent identification, analysis, and synthesis of relevant information; appraisal of the credibility of information sources; and feedback on these skills from faculty and/or staff. | Unsatisfactory |
7.1 | Biomedical, Behavioral, Social Sciences The faculty of a medical school ensure that the medical curriculum includes content from the biomedical, behavioral, and socioeconomic sciences to support medical students' mastery of contemporary medical science knowledge and concepts and the methods fundamental to applying them to the health of individuals and populations. | Unsatisfactory |
8.4 | Evaluation of Educational Program Outcomes A medical school collects and uses a variety of outcome data, including national norms of accomplishment, to demonstrate the extent to which medical students are achieving medical education program objectives and to enhance the quality of the medical education program as a whole. These data are collected during program enrollment and after program completion. | Unsatisfactory |
9.4 | Assessment System A medical school ensures that, throughout its medical education program, there is a centralized system in place that employs a variety of measures (including direct observation) for the assessment of student achievement, including students' acquisition of the knowledge, core clinical skills (e.g., medical history-taking, physical examination), behaviors, and attitudes specified in medical education program objectives, and that ensures that all medical students achieve the same medical education program objectives. | Unsatisfactory |
9.7 | Formative Assessment and Feedback The medical school's curricular governance committee ensures that each medical student is assessed and provided with formal formative feedback early enough during each required course or clerkship to allow sufficient time for remediation. Formal feedback occurs at least at the midpoint of the course or clerkship. A course or clerkship less than four weeks in length provides alternate means by which medical students can measure their progress in learning. | Unsatisfactory |
9.9 | Student Advancement and Appeal Process A medical school ensures that the medical education program has a single set of core standards for the advancement and graduation of all medical students across all locations. A subset of medical students may have academic requirements in addition to the core standards if they are enrolled in a parallel curriculum. A medical school ensures that there is a fair and formal process for taking any action that may affect the status of a medical student, including timely notice of the impending action, disclosure of the evidence on which the action would be based, an opportunity for the medical student to respond, and an opportunity to appeal any adverse decision related to advancement, graduation, or dismissal. | Unsatisfactory |
The following element was determined to be unsatisfactory in response to a student complaint in Fall 2023.
Element | Element Description | Initial Finding |
9.8 | Fair and Timely Summative Assessment A medical school has in place a system of fair and timely summative assessment of medical student achievement in each course and clerkship of the medical education program. Final grades are available within six weeks of the end of a course or clerkship. | Unsatisfactory |