PURPOSE
With the Step 1 exam switching to pass/fail, medical students are
increasingly requesting research opportunities to distinguish themselves
while applying for residency, regardless of specialty. The most opportune
time for the bulk of this research is the summer between their first and
second years of medical school. The fact that Mercer University School of
Medicine (MUSM) has three 4-year medical school campuses introduces an
additional layer of complexity to managing equal research opportunities for
all students.
METHODS
We developed a six-week medical student summer research program that
supports students who are interested in multiple types of research (academic/medical
education, bench, clinical, and population health) and provides both remote
and in-person participation options. Our program involves the Match-style
assignment of students with faculty research projects, six professional
development sessions, an end-of-summer research summary paper, and an oral or
poster presentation at a university-sponsored conference.
RESULTS
Our program expanded in 2022, and each summer over 100 MUSM students
participated in summer research. With our growing class sizes, typically
80-90% of eligible students participate in the summer research program. Every
student who participated in the program gained one research outcome resulting
from their summer research. Many students also present at external
conferences. In 2025, 78% of the class participated in the summer research
program. Of these students, 66% wrote a summary report and received a
monetary research award, and more than 90% presented at our October Joint
Research Conference.
CONCLUSIONS
Our summer research program has connected medical students with mentors and
offered instruction and advice in literature review, writing papers,
presenting research, and continuing research into the clinical years of
medical school and beyond. We predict that this model can be adapted for
other medical schools and non-medical students with differing interests and
time commitments during a summer research period.