The University of Vermont College of Medicine welcomed its largest first-year class in history on August 8, 2016 for Orientation 2016, a week-long course that launches their medical school career. The Class of 2020’s 120 members were selected from roughly 6,000 applicants and 619 interviewees.

Ready to begin their four-year journey to becoming doctors, students in the Class of 2020 hail from 24 states – 34 of them from Vermont – and bring with them a diversity of academic and life experience, including undergraduate majors ranging from neuroscience and biomedical engineering to archaeological studies and Portuguese. Some have been inventors, small business owners, competitive figure skaters and one was a Billboard-charting bass guitarist.

Orientation 2016 featured a week of welcome activities and events designed to help students become familiar with UVM and the Burlington community, as well as provide a transition to their first classes in the Foundations Level of the Vermont Integrated Curriculum.

Among the week’s highlights: On their very first day of medical school, members of the Class of 2020 were introduced to their first patient through an activity with a Standardized Patient in UVM’s Clinical Simulation Laboratory. A presentation on diversity and inclusion, along with an introduction to the College’s 33 week-long Professionalism, Communication and Reflection course, lay the foundation for an education centered on the humanistic practice of medicine. On August 10, the class got to know the Burlington community through volunteer work in Burlington’s Intervale at the Tommy Thompson Community Garden, the largest in a network of gardens maintained by Burlington’s Department of Parks and Recreation. On August 9, they participated in a teamwork exercise at UVM’s ropes course facility, as well as a roundtable luncheon with student ambassadors and on August 12, the group gathered for a welcome barbecue with student leadership. View the Class of 2020 Orientation schedule.

Meet some of UVM’s newest medical students:

• As an undergraduate at UVM majoring in microbiology and molecular genetics, Burlington, Vt. native Lauren Donnelly has been studying the mechanisms of germination in the antibiotic-resistant, spore-forming pathogen Clostridium difficile (C.diff) for the past two years. Her work with former UVM Assistant Professor Aimee Shen, Ph.D., led to a first author credit on a study published by the Journal of Bacteriology, and a second first-author publication is in the works. She’s presented her research here at UVM and abroad. Although starting medical school can be a daunting experience, she’ll be able to call on some family support. “My older brother, Liam Donnelly, is a third-year medical student and watching his experience has been very inspiring for me,” she says. “I am thrilled to remain at UVM and look forward to building on the excellent education that I have received to date.”
• Nikolas Moring, a native of Sabattus, Maine, graduated from UVM in 2015 with a degree in microbiology. His interest in medicine stems in part from his work as an assistant director of the Area Health Education Center’s MedQuest program in Bennington, Vt., and Advanced MedQuest in Burlington. MedQuest is a series of week-long programs that bring high school students from around Vermont together for workshops, shadowing experiences and other activities to introduce participants to career options in medicine and healthcare. Moring counts his experience in UVM’s Pre-Medical Enhancement Program shadowing Rachel Inker, M.D., a family physician at Burlington’s Community Health Center, as a major reason he decided to attend medical school. “On Thursdays she ran a clinic that specialized in treating transgender patients,” he says. “It was an experience that left a profound impact on me, changed how I think about myself and others, and reminded me why I was interested in medicine in the first place.”
• Emily Vayda came to UVM from Wichita, Kansas, and graduated in 2016 with a degree in biochemistry. While pursuing two minors, in nutrition and food science and community and international development, she became involved with different food security, public service and social justice groups on campus, including the Campus Kitchens Project. She served as president for the UVM chapter of the non-profit, which helps to combat hunger in the local community by growing fresh produce, recovering food from campus cafeterias, and teaching nutrition. During her time at UVM she also served as a pre-health peer mentor with the Career Center, hosting workshops and discussions for students interested in healthcare. “I chose to apply to medical school at UVM because I love working with my neighbors to improve the community, especially by empowering others to care about their health,” she says. “Vermont is forward thinking in medicine and in educating future health practitioners, which is promising to me and my peers.” Her father, James Vayda, M.D., is a Class of 1987 alumnus of UVM the College of Medicine.

The Class of 2020 is the first group of students to take the UVM College of Medicine’s new “Foundations of Clinical Science” course, which replaces two former Vermont Integrated Curriculum courses. They will also have access to the College’s second active learning classroom, which will open in late August, and in spring 2017, will be able to utilize the new Larner Learning Commons space currently under construction in the Dana Medical Library. The space will include not only a large quiet study area with 24/7 access, but will also house the UVM College of Medicine’s Teaching Academy.