Curriculum Committee
Policy
Mission
The Curriculum Committee has primary responsibility for the oversight and management of the curriculum. It is responsible for the development, design, implementation, management, monitoring, integration, review, evaluation, and revision of the undergraduate medical education curriculum of the school to ensure continuous quality improvement. This curriculum management process is guided by the 12 Competencies Required of the Contemporary Physician.
Vision
To foster excellence in undergraduate medical education by actively engaging, motivating, and guiding students in the never-ending acquisition of knowledge to help them advance health promotion and disease prevention within society as well as to prepare them to deliver technically advanced, patient-centered and compassionate care to future patient populations.
Curriculum Committee Governance
The Curriculum Committee derives the source of its authority from the school of medicine bylaws, Per the bylaws, the Curriculum Committee has the authority to set educational objectives, establish educational requirements, establish and approve content, ensure content integration, coordination and coherence, allocate curriculum time, specify teaching and assessment methods, select and oversee course and clerkship directors, and evaluate educational outcomes.
The Committee is responsible to:
- establish and approve the education program objectives and to review and reaffirm or alter them during each review of the full curriculum;
- design, manage, and evaluate the undergraduate medical program to ensure the education program objectives are met in accordance with the mission and vision of the School of Medicine and the requirements of the Liaison Committee on Medical Education and the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools;
- establish a process for reviewing, evaluating, and revising each segment of the curriculum on a recurring timeline to ensure that the curriculum is integrated, coherent, coordinated, current, and effective;
- establish performance standards for instructors, requiring faculty development efforts, and evaluating instructor performance;
- advise the Dean of the School of Medicine on resources required to support the curriculum;
- establish performance standards required for promotion and graduation.
Meetings
The Chair shall convene and preside over Committee meetings. The Vice-Chair shall convene and preside over Committee meetings in the absence of the Chair. Regular meetings are scheduled every Monday afternoon from 4-5 pm unless there is a national holiday.No meetings will be scheduled in July and the first week of August. At the Chair’s discretion during this time, emergent Committee business may be transacted electronically.
Voting/Quorum
The views of all members of the Committee will be heard during deliberations, but only those members with voting privileges shall vote. Although more than two SMEC representatives can attend the meetings, when issues that require voting occur, only one representative from Phase 1 (pre-clerkship) and one from Phase 2 and 3 (clerkship/post-clerkship) can vote.
A quorum for the Curriculum Committee shall be constituted when a simple majority (greater than 50%) of voting members is present, including the chair. Official votes may be taken only when a quorum is present and all motions shall pass by a simple majority. The Chair has the prerogative of obtaining an electronic vote should an urgent decision be needed when a quorum has not been attained.
Minutes
Meeting minutes are posted in VMED and are sent directly to the dean and education administration.
The Committee is comprised of faculty from the Charlottesville and Inova campuses. There are nine voting ex-officio faculty members and four voting ex-officio student members, twelve voting at-large faculty members and six non-voting faculty advisory resources. Of the twelve at-large faculty members, ten are from the main campus, and two are from the regional campus.
By virtue of their positions, the following are voting members of the Committee:
- Associate Dean for Curriculum (Chair)—votes only to break a tie
- Associate Dean for Assessment, Evaluation, Research and Scholarly Innovation
- Director of Clinical Competency
- Representative, Office of Diversity
- Chairs, Phase 1 Subcommittee (2)
- Chair, Phase 2 Subcommittee
- Chair, Phase 3 Subcommittee
- Thread Leader Representative
- President, Mulholland Society
- Student Medical Education Committee (SMEC) representatives (2)
- Inova Academic Student Representative
By virtue of their positions, the following are non-voting, advisory resources to the committee:
- Director of the Claude Moore Health Sciences Library
- Assistant Dean for Clinical Skills Education
- Assistant Dean for Curriculum—Inova campus
- Director of Education Technology
- Director of Curriculum Evaluation
- Director of Academic Enhancement
Appointment of At-Large Members
At-large members are elected from the School of Medicine (SOM)Charlottesville and Inova faculty based on their sustained interest and active participation in undergraduate medical education (UME) and shall not hold a current SOM administrative position. Elections for the Charlottesville faculty will be held annually over the summer as needed to maintain ten members. Each June, the Dean of the School of Medicine requests self-nominations to fill any open at-large positions. This call will include committee member responsibilities and requirements. Interested faculty may send the Chair a letter of intent outlining their desire to participate, explaining their teaching experiences and describing their visions and view for medical education. The School of Medicine’s 23 elected Faculty Senate representatives will elect at-large members from the slate provided by the Chair to ensure a broad faculty perspective in the Committee’s decision-making.
The two at-large faculty members from the Inova Campus are selected in a parallel process which includes self-nomination by interested candidates followed by selection by the medical education leadership team at the Inova Campus.
Committee Member Responsibilities
All Committee members are expected to contribute to the Committee’s activities and attend at least two-thirds (2/3) of regular meetings during an academic year. The Chair shall review attendance annually to determine whether each member’s responsibility has been met. Failure to participate as required will jeopardize committee membership.
Student Members
There are four voting student members of the Committee: the President of the Mulholland Society, two representatives of the Student Medical Education Committee (one representing pre-clerkship phase and one representing the clerkship/post-clerkship phases) and the Inova academic student representative.
Terms
The Chair serves at the discretion of the Dean of the School of Medicine. The Vice-Chair serves for the period of his/her term. The term for at-large faculty is three years, with the potential for one consecutive renewal at the discretion of the Chair. Anyone desiring to continue service to the Committee beyond two terms must wait a period of two years before reapplying.
Additional term renewals could be granted, at the discretion of the chair, to avoid significant overturn of the committee’s membership during a single year. This would assure maintenance of institutional and committee experience.
Appointment of Chair/Selection of Vice-Chair
The Chair shall be the Associate Dean for Curriculum by virtue of the position. At-large members will select one of their group to serve as the Vice-Chair of the Committee.
Resignations
Members who no longer wish to serve on the Curriculum Committee shall submit their resignations in writing to the Chair.