The first semester back gave an opportunity to recruit new and existing student representatives across the medical school. A drive to have more student reps resulted in having a vast coverage of years and courses which fall under the medical school. This has presented a unique ability to have more student engagement with staff and also to allow new and existing initiatives to be worked on.

We had the first SSLC meeting where our aims for this year were discussed and what areas of the medical school we felt would benefit from our ideas and input. We divided roles and met with staff to introduce ourselves and get a feel for the different staff committees we would be working with. There was a sense of purpose and positivity with the reps that they wanted to make change and be a positive voice for the students.

Over the course of the first semester the reps have engaged with various teaching, staff and assessment committees which have all gave feedback showing how valued the students were at these discussions. This has also meant that decisions moving forward that will impact students have had student input in decisions.

On top of working with staff the student reps have been working on projects of their own to make student life easier or better. These include:

• Student identification on placement through scrubs, name badges or lanyards which has been presented to senior staff for approval.
• PALS- The medical school courses has never been involved with the university wide PALS initiative but the reps have been working hard on providing this and growing it to support students.
• Yearly site allocations improvement- A keen group of reps have been working with staff to provide a better solution that is fairer for all students in regards to site allocations.

The above are some of the bigger projects but there have been a number of smaller projects that have been running concurrently. On top of this the reps have been liaising with their cohorts of students making sure they are supported. This all couldn’t be possible without the support of the staff who engage with us and also John Chilton and Helen Watson who are excelling at supporting students not just through SSLC but also address other student matters.

Rickie

5^th Year Medical student and School Representative