Illinois Medicine

and friends from all over the world to share in the joy of this rite of passage," says Kathleen Kashima, PhD, senior associate dean of students. "There were so many unsung heroes—from communications directors and IT personnel to planning committee members—who spent hours and hours planning and organizing these ceremonies so that we could show the members of the Class of 2020 how important they are to our College of Medicine community." By early June, the deans had other decisions to make as the realities of the pandemic began to shift. "At this point, we had adequate PPE and testing supplies and felt that the clinical environments were very safe, so we made the decision to reintroduce M3 and M4 students into clinical settings," Curry says. To facilitate this transition, Kashima joined forces with Durst and Urbana Medical Student Government President Alex Cerjanic to form the Clinical Re-Entry Work Group. "The University Medical Student Council played an invaluable role in preparing students for the return to clinical life by sharing student concerns with the College's senior leadership," Kashima says. "Without them, we could not have made informed decisions and adjustments as quickly as we did." When Durst started his sub-internship in medicine in July, he encountered a radically altered clinical landscape. "There was an online temperature/wellness check-in link that we had to complete for building access, as well as temperature screenings at the door," he recalls. "Everyone wore masks, and we socially distanced as much as possible. We were instructed to avoid meeting patients being admitted from the ED until they arrived on the floor with negative COVID test results, and we no longer rounded as a large team on every patient." Nonetheless, Durst adds, "It felt really good to be back, to be a member of a team and to have a positive impact on our patients—a sentiment that was widely shared amongst our class. We just wanted to be useful again." The silver linings ALTHOUGH THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC WILL BE REMEMBERED as one of the College of Medicine's most challenging chapters, it also paved the way for positive change. "In so many ways, the pandemic was a trial by fire," reflects Kashima. "But it was an unforgettable medical experience that will change the course of some students' careers. The disruptions of the pandemic also gave us the freedom to experiment with new forms of content delivery that have been surprisingly effective." For Durst, the lessons of COVID-19 are more counterintuitive—given the months of social isolation that he and his fellow students endured in 2020. "The town halls and stepped- up communications have created a lot more interconnectivity between the four campuses, which makes us feel like we're part of a larger community," he says. "I was impressed by the way that my fellow students dealt with the uncertainties of the pandemic. They adapted with resilience and creativity and appropriately brought up concerns that needed to be heard. We also had easy and ready access to Dean Rosenblatt and his team, which enabled us to elevate those concerns and ensure that student issues were addressed. This has helped us feel like we're all in this together." campuswide communiques and email updates, as well as all-campus town hall meetings facilitated by the University Medical Student Council. These channels of communication proved to be a saving grace for many College of Medicine students. "The ability to roll with the punches doesn't come naturally to most of us," admits Durst, who organized and hosted the all-campus town hall meetings. "We like things to proceed in an orderly fashion, so we know what to expect. These town halls, which every student could access via an emailed link, gave us an opportunity to ask questions and hear directly from the deans about some of our most pressing concerns." The new normal FROM MID-MARCH TO MID-JUNE, THE STUDENTS SETTLED INTO THE NEW NORMAL OF PANDEMIC LIFE—a life of sweatpants, self-paced learning on virtual platforms, livestreamed lectures, digital hand-raising and questions typed into Zoom chat sidebars. "It started to get monotonous," confides Durst, who didn't see a single patient during his six-week family medicine clerkship. "Every day, I'd get up and think about how strange it was that I didn't have to put on a shirt and tie. As the weather got warmer, I broke up the monotony by writing daily letters to my wife, who was at the University of Michigan, and dropping them into different mailboxes around the neighborhood." Although certain opportunities had been lost, new opportunities arose. M4s who had met all of their graduation requirements were cleared to graduate in April, a month early, in the hope that they could report to their residencies early and bolster the ranks of the physicians working and perhaps feeling overwhelmed on the front lines of the pandemic. Virtual commencement ceremonies were livestreamed for the first time in the COM's history, allowing a far larger audience to celebrate the hard-earned accomplishments of the Class of 2020. "These virtual commencements enabled family members " " The University Medical Student Council played an invaluable role in preparing students for the return to clinical life by sharing student concerns with the College's senior leadership. Kathleen Kashima, PhD senior associate dean of students Kathleen Kashima, PhD 28 | Spring 2021

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