The Medical School of the Future
New Learning Center is central to vision for medical education
"See one, do one, teach one," that mantra of medical education, no longer describes the way students are learning medicine at Duke and other top medical schools.
"Today it's more like practice, practice, practice, do one, practice, practice," said Dr. Edward G. Buckley, vice dean for medical education.
Instead of practicing on patients in the hospital wards, students in the future will spend many hours working with high tech simulators. This is not only safer for patients, it builds confidence in the students before they have to face a live patient.
"Research has shown that adult learners retain information best through interactive problem solving and immediate feedback," said Buckley.
So, large classrooms with lots of small group workstations are replacing traditional lecture halls. Also, the sheer volume of medical knowledge has grown such that students are no longer expected to memorize vast amounts of information. Instead they rely on wireless technology that puts information at their fingertips.
According to Dean Nancy C. Andrews, the school's recent re-accreditation process confirmed what students, administration, and faculty have been saying for years.
"We need new learning spaces for our students this was the primary recommendation of our self study groups and the LCME committee," said Andrews.
For the past 12 months, she, Buckley, and a committee of 29 faculty members, administrators, and medical students have been researching, debating, and planning a new facility that will accommodate this new interactive, technology-based way of teaching and learning.
In May their concept received site, scope, and architect approval from the Duke University Board of Trustees, the first step in the process toward building the new Learning Center. The center will be the first new facility dedicated to medical student education at Duke since the School of Medicine began holding classes in the Davison Building in 1930.
A Well-Connected Address
The Davison Building, located on Duke's West Quad and named for founding dean Wilburt Cornell Davison will remain an important part of the Duke School of Medicine. The office of the dean and the new Gross Anatomy Lab, which is shared by many programs, will remain in Davison, as well as other School of Medicine administrative functions and the newer auditoriums.
As currently planned, the Learning Center will be located in the heart of Duke's medical campus, just off the walkway connecting Duke Hospital and the Duke Clinic. An existing building, the Facilities Center, which houses the Medical Center Bookstore, will be demolished. The Learning Center will be constructed on that site and will connect to the Medical Center Library and Searle Center.
An indoor concourse now under construction will replace the current walkway and connect all of the clinical facilities from the current Morris Cancer Clinic to Duke Hospital. A planned plaza and esplanade will connect the Learning Center to the research and laboratory facilities on Research Drive as well as to the rest of the Medical Campus. The esplanade will lead to a planned major expansion of Duke Hospital to be called Duke Medicine Pavilion and a planned new ambulatory cancer building, as well as the Duke Clinic and the School of Nursing. The esplanade and a new oval garden will connect the clinical, research, and educational parts of the medical campus for the first time since the PRT (rapid transit) tracks were installed in the late 1970s.
The Learning Center's location was chosen over three other possible sites, two on either end of the Davison Building and one near the Jones and Sands buildings on Research Drive. The site is the most central point to the clinical and research facilities, where students spend most of their time, and will facilitate cross disciplinary education. It was by far the most popular location among current medical students. Another advantage is its proximity to the Medical Center Library and opportunities for sharing space.
As currently planned the building is 84,000 square feet and will have three to five floors, including a large auditorium and places to gather, dine, and study. A student life center will support a sense of community and facilitate mentoring relationships with faculty.
The new building's educational areas will include flexible spaces with moveable walls to accommodate large group, small group, and individual learning; amphitheaters and function rooms; simulation laboratories; and more than 10,000 square feet of clinical skills laboratories. Many of the classrooms will be designed based on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT ) model of Technology Enabled Active Learning (TEAL ), which breaks students into small working groups for problem solving with computer support. This model has recently been used at Stanford, University of Virginia, and Johns Hopkins medical schools. Some medical school administrative offices, as well as admissions and financial aid will also be housed in the new building.