Friday, November 1, 2013

Well, today ends another great week at Salus!  On Tuesday I had the opportunity to participate in some videotaping of what we're calling "vignettes" of student life here at Salus.  The high point for me was having the opportunity to sit down and talk with some of our first year optometry students - totally unplanned.  It was fun to hear how they were adapting to life as a health professional student.  Since our first-year curriculum is fairly rigorous as compared to some of the other programs out there, our students were expressing to me how busy they were but also how they were managing their time and enjoying the program - and even finding time to enjoy some of the great things Philadelphia has to offer.  Brought me back to the good ole days :-).

So, you may be wondering what we're going to do with these vignettes (at least I hope you are).  Well, our Facebook page has a bit anemic so we're going to spice things up and integrate some real student input and experiences.  I'm personally looking forward to seeing the final product.

A high point of the week for me was meeting with the chairs of the Tiger Teams I appointed at the beginning of my 100 days of listening.  Now that the 100 days are over, each team provided me their impressions and answers to the questions I posed back in July:  What's working well at Salus?  What are some of the opportunities and challenges we have at Salus? What's broken and needs to be addressed now?  The good news is there were few surprises.  I've scheduled an "All University" meeting next week to share the results with students and staff.  Once I do that, I'll post the summary on the blog.  Next step will be to work closely with our President's Council to use this great input to inform our strategic plan for the next 3-5 years.  I'm extremely excited about what I've heard and even more so about what we can do with the information.  Stay tuned for more to come on this.

Today we hosted State Senator Mike Folmer from Lancaster County, PA and Pennsylvania Optometric Association President Dr. Bob Owens (a classmate).  We were able to show the senator and Dr. Owens many of the great things that are going on around Salus to include a deep dive into our optometry program, a tour of the Elkins Park campus and a discussion with students and deans from each of the colleges.  Both left with a much better appreciation for what Salus brings not only to our students and local community but also to the state and U.S. healthcare delivery system.

I wish everyone a safe and relaxing Fall weekend.  Don't forget to set your clocks back on Saturday evening!



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