SCHOOL OF MEDICINE HEADING FOR ACCREDITATION

The Keele School of Medicine was visited last week by the General Medical Council. It was a high stakes visit; a final step towards accreditation of the new curriculum and achieving a Keele MBChB degree independent of Manchester.

Verbal feedback offered by the GMC team on completion of the two day visit was most positive.  They were impressed by the friendly, open atmosphere of the school and the development of a strong sense of a 'Keele identity'.  They commented on the high quality of the Year 4 students they interviewed, pictured above, and felt the School should be justifiably proud.

A notable high point of the visit was the attendance of 15 representatives, Chief Executives and Medical Directors from our partner NHS trusts across the West Midlands. They voiced a strong commitment to the Medical School. The presence of medical students, and the School of Medicine itself, is impacting most favourably on health care across the Midlands.

Professor Val Wass, Head of the School of Medicine, said: "Overall, we received a strong message that we are on track for accreditation in December this year and graduating our first cohort of Keele students in July 2011."

SO YOU WANT TO BE A DOCTOR

The School of Medicine, in association with the Royal Society of Medicine, this week hosted a Medicine Careers Day for young people, aged 15 and 16, who wanted to find out more about training to become a doctor.

It was the ninth time that Keele has hosted the "So You Want To Be A Doctor" event and it attracted 250, Year 10 – 12 students to the campus. The programme included a range of talks such as 'why choose a career in medicine', 'choosing a medical school' and 'entry requirements and the interview', plus a range of practical sessions.
 
There was also a careers talk and an admissions panel 'Question and Answer' session.

MUSIC AND THE BRAIN

Professor Rajmil Fischman, Research Institute for Humanities, was one of nine invited speakers at the Music and the Brain Symposium at Stanford University, California. 

The team of guest speakers included presenters from a wide variety of disciplines, including brain physiology, aging, psychology, musicology and creative arts. Professor Fischman's paper, ¿Te Acuerdas Hijo? - Time and Memories discussed issues concerning time and memory in the context of the artistic process, with particular emphasis on his audiovisual work Do you Remember Son? (¿Te Acuerdas Hijo?). The latter was performed as part of the presentation.

More information can be found here. Do you Remember Son?  can be viewed online at http://vimeo.com/10868246.

MEDICAL SCHOOL WELCOMES PALESTINIAN VISITORS

Two guests from Palestinian Medical Schools met academic staff, clinicians and medical students during a three day stay at Keele. Dr Mahmoud A.A. Khrishi, Director of Psychiatry, Al-Najah University, and Dr Samah Jabar, Director of Psychiatry, Birzeit University and Ramallah Community Mental Health Centre, are visiting a number of medical schools to find out how the behavioural and social sciences are taught in under-graduate medical curricula in the UK.

The visit was initiated through the World Health Organisation, funded through the International Medical Education Trust and organised by Behavioural and Social Science Teachers in Medicine. It was arranged at Keele by Judy Rock, Co-ordinator of Behavioural and Social Sciences, Medical School.

During their stay at Keele the visitors learned how behavioural and social sciences are integrated into the medical curriculum and the innovative ways in which they are delivered across the different years of the MBChB. They observed a lecture on Poverty and Health, delivered by Dr Lauren Brooks, and examples of small group teaching, including an inter-professional activity. They also visited a number of community placements in the Stoke area. Medical students from Medsin, a network of students with an interest in global health, met the visitors to offer their views of behavioural and social sciences in the curriculum and to learn about healthcare in Palestine, with a view to developing possible exchange programmes.

The visitors are pictured with academic staff from the Keele Medical School - Dr Lindsay Bashford, Director of Academic Undergraduate Studies and the behavioural and social sciences team – Mrs Judy Rock, Dr Lauren Brooks (Sociology) and Dr Penny List (Psychology).

A DEGREE ISN'T ENOUGH ANYMORE

Professor Clare Holdsworth, Social Geography, this week gave the latest lecture in the University's programme of Inaugural Lectures for 2010/11.

 At a time of considerable challenges facing Higher Education, those facing undergraduates are particularly acute. Not only are students finding it harder to secure a place, but on graduating the competition for jobs is intense.  One aspect of these changes is that students are increasingly encouraged to make the most of their time at university, to build up relevant experiences and to promote themselves to potential employers. 

The lecture, "'A degree isn't enough anymore': Student experiences and orientation to HE", explored the challenges of this revaluation of undergraduate education, not just to universities, but to students themselves and how students from different backgrounds navigate the increasing complexity of what it means to be a student.

The last lecture in the series is by Professor Krysia Dziedzic, Primary Care Health Sciences, "Best evidence for best therapies in osteoarthritis", on Tuesday, 10 May, 2011.

TAKING THE LECTURE OUT OF LECTURES

Dr Katherine Haxton and Dr David McGarvey (Chemistry, School of Physical and Geographical Sciences) have been awarded £4,735 by the Higher Education Academy UK Physical Sciences Centre for a project entitled 'Making time for active learning through the use of screencast pre-lectures'. 

The project involves replacement of face-to-face lectures with short online pre-lecture screencasts that capture slides with audio commentary and pen movements/writing in order to release lecture time for interactive learning activities.  It is envisaged that this approach will lead to better teaching and a more varied and active learning environment for students,  providing increased flexibility to learn at a time and pace that better suits individual learning styles.

STAFFORDSHIRE HOARD AWARD

Dr Jamie Pringle, Dr Vladimir Zholobenko, Dr Nigel Cassidy, Dr Craig Adam (all Research Institute for the Environment, Physical Sciences and Applied Mathematics) and Dr Shanta Aphale (Office for Research and Enterprise), together with forensic science colleagues at Staffordshire University have been awarded £20,000 by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) for a Public Engagement in Science four month project entitled 'The Staffordshire Hoard 2011', which is to be held at the Potteries Museum in Stoke-on-Trent tomorrow.

The event is themed on last year's discovery of the £3.1m valued Hoard, including interactive displays on geophysical detection, archaeological recovery, gold panning, garnet identification, footwear and wound analysis, and a drama production by Haywood High School students. For further details see here.

FT LETTER ON CREDIT RATING AGENCIES

In a letter published by The Financial Times, Professor Costas Milas (Keele Management School) argues that the latest credit decisions made by The Moody's credit rating agency are at best questionable. 

He argues that the latest reduction of Greek bonds to "highly speculative" status puts at risk the recovery hopes of Greece and those of other peripheral countries faced with the prospect of a similar decision. 

Professor Milas refers to recent academic work which suggests that only a minority of credit decisions made by all main credit rating agencies are justified by economic fundamentals and concludes that peripheral countries have a point in complaining about the behaviour of credit rating agencies.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

Nine years ago –

The world's largest model of DNA, built at the Potteries Shopping Centre in Hanley, has been recognised as a new world record by Guinness World Records. The 10.78 metre model, containing over 1,500 atoms, was a joint venture between the University and Daresbury Laboratory. 

Base pair units were made by 3,000 school children from Staffordshire and Cheshire and celebrities from science, politics and the arts. The project received funding from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), Science Year and the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Project leader Dr Graeme Jones, of Keele University, said, "It was awe inspiring to see the model grow". 18 March 2002.