The clinical faculty approaches the board of trustees in good faith to restore quality to the curriculum and stability to the campus. K.C.O.M. has reached this point after months of frustration with the current administrative situation. With this document we have illustrated just a few of the administrative practices that impede our academic duties. We approach the board in good faith with the hope to further enable quality education at K.C.O.M.
For the clinical faculty to commit to quality student education, we need stability and sincere academic leadership at the dean’s office. A new dean must have oversight of student affairs, admissions, and control of the academic budget. A new dean should be responsive to the wishes of promotion boards and overturning decisions should be with good cause and rare. We ardently need a dean with credentials that meet or exceed national standards who is well respected by the Kirksville faculty and the general profession.
We would like to see real leadership from a president who is responsive to the needs of the general faculty and the students.
The organization of the administration should be balanced with stronger clinical faculty representation. We have a vested interest in the curriculum committee, in whose decisions rest the future of our students. Practicing physicians should have a majority voice in the educational experience of the students. Who else but a physician knows what it takes to train a physician?
In closing, we would submit to the board that each one of the clinical faculty has nothing to gain by our actions except for one thing, an improvement in the student experience at K.C.O.M. and a brighter standing for our beloved school in the profession. We have a great love for the college and a passion for our profession. We are genuinely concerned with the direction the college is heading and more importantly, a higher concern for the enduring educational quality of our graduates. They will soon be our colleagues and potentially your future physicians. We wish for K.C.O.M. to become a leader in our profession with solid clinical research of osteopathic theory to substantiate or refute what is being taught in the classroom, just like any other specialty field in medicine.
Respectfully submitted to the K.C.O.M. Board of Trustees on 6/4/00.
The Clinical Faculty
