 |
NYCOM Celebration Nears
Thousands of doctors and alumni are expected to make house calls to NYIT this fall, when NYCOM opens its year-long 25th anniversary celebration in October.
NYCOM (New York College of Osteopathic Medicine) is the country's second-largest medical school and the only school of osteopathic medicine in New York. The school, which is a division of NYIT, opened in 1977 and has more than 3,000 alumni.
As this story went to press, NYCOM was planning several silver anniversary events, which are slated to kick off in the fall and run through spring of 2003. The celebrations will include live events, Web sites, multimedia presentations and marketing initiatives.
NYCOM is expected to host an on-campus celebration in Old Westbury, N.Y., in spring 2003, to culminate the event. The weekend event will include prominent guest speakers from the medical community and a series of roundtable discussions related to research, curriculum development and education.
NYCOM also plans to host a party at the American Osteopathic Association's annual convention, which kicks off Oct. 7 in Las Vegas.
Carrie Cliggett, NYIT's new special events manager, will assist with logistics for each celebration. Cliggett joined NYIT in May after a successful tour of duty at Fortune magazine.
The celebration will also highlight a changing of the guard at NYCOM, where Dr. Barbara Ross-Lee, an NYIT vice president since 2001, gains added responsibility as dean of NYCOM. She succeeds Dr. Stanley Schiowitz, who becomes dean emeritus and a part-time consultant in curriculum development.
The transition marks the end of an era-and a new beginning-for NYCOM. Dr. Schiowitz has been associated with NYCOM for 25 years and served as dean for the last 11 years. He is widely credited for building, enhancing and promoting NYCOM as one of the country's leading medical schools. During his tenure, NYCOM expanded from an inaugural class of 36 to the current total enrollment of about 1,100 students.
Dr. Ross-Lee, meanwhile, plans to take NYCOM to new heights. Her strategy for the medical school includes four key initiatives-unity, community, continuity and visibility.
Unity calls for NYCOM to work more closely with its training partners and alumni; community will include new programs to improve health care services on Long Island; continuity will make it easier for students to transition from classroom to clinical settings; and visibility will include new marketing and public relations efforts to promote NYCOM.
Dr. Ross-Lee joined NYCOM in 2001 as both dean of Allied Health and Life Sciences and VP for Health Sciences and Medical Affairs. She formerly served as dean at Ohio University, starting in 1993. She holds a Doctor of Osteopathy degree from Michigan State University.
Dr. Ross-Lee is one of seven women who currently head a U.S. medical school and the only woman of color to hold such a position.
Dr. Ross-Lee inherits a particularly strong medical program from Dr. Schiowitz.
As dean of NYCOM, Dr. Schiowitz formulated the framework for New York's widely respected hospital consortium, which serves as an important role model for the Osteopathic Postgraduate Training Institutes.
Dr. Schiowitz also pioneered the émigré physician program, which educates talented foreign doctors as osteopathic physicians, so that they may gain employment as doctors in this country.
|
|
