The Rho Chi Society
Annual Chapter Report
Annual Chapter Report
Date of report submission: May 15, 2015
Name of School/College: Duquesne University Mylan School of Pharmacy
Chapter name and region: Alpha Beta Chapter: Region II
Chapter advisor’s name and e-mail address: Dr. David Lapinsky:
Delegate who attended the Rho Chi Annual Meeting: Alana Grabigel
Date delegate’s name submitted to Rho Chi.: 3/29/2015
Past year’s officers and e-mail addresses:
President: Regis Bender ()
Vice President: Casey Arkwright ()
Secretary: Erica Carbaugh ()
Treasurer: Alana Grabigel ()
Historian: Cynthia Kuntz ()
New officers and e-mail addresses for next academic year:
President: Katheryn Wendekier ()
Vice President: Megan Jackson ()
Secretary: Alexis Deleo ()
Treasurer: Katherine Hilton ()
Historian: Laruen Curry ()
Number of Rho Chi student members at college or school, listed by class year and program (and by campus if more than one campus):
· Class of 2015: 37 members (weekend and traditional pathway combined)
· Class of 2016: 38 members (weekend and traditional pathway combined)
· Class of 2017: 38 members (weekend and traditional pathway combined)
Meetings: Provide information on meetings held in the following tabular format (Limit 1.5 page)
Note: If your chapter is part of a split campus, please list the meetings with campus reference under the Attendance (i.e. A, B or 1, 2 with a note to indicate the campus of reference).
Date / Attendance / Agenda / Action Steps8/27/2014 / 24 / The sole purpose of this meeting was to serve as an orientation for the new members who would be serving as tutors for the 2014-2015 academic year. / Tutors were instructed to complete the necessary payroll and human resources forms and to begin meeting with professors to develop a strategic plan for tutoring during the academic year
9/3/2014 / 32 / The purpose of this meeting was to discuss the pharmacy mentor program, fundraising, and finalize paperwork for tutoring. / Tutors were instructed to follow up with the administration to ensure all paperwork was filed so that they could begin tutoring, fundraising forms for t-shirts were asked to be turned in by the following Friday, and students were asked to sign up for the pharmacy mentor program if they wished to participate.
10/01/14 / 32 / Dr. J. Douglas Bricker was in attendance to speak to the chapter about the history and importance of Rho Chi / Members were asked to submit three things that they wanted to get out of their membership this academic year by the end of the week.
12/03/14 / 25 / This meeting served as our annual Rho Chi/PLS Christmas party. / Members were asked to decide and submit what classes they wished to tutor in the spring semester so that we could complete the tutoring schedule.
2/4/2015 / 30 / The purpose of this meeting was to elect the newly eligible class into the Rho Chi Society / Contact all new members and provide them with their letter of acceptance and other pertinent information in regards to the induction ceremony
3/25/2015 / 35 / This sole purpose of this meeting was to serve as elections for the new executive board for the 2015-2016 academic year. / Newly elected executive members were instructed to set up an appointment with their corresponding predecessor to begin the transition of responsibilities.
Strategic Planning: What goals were set that relate to the Rho Chi mission? (Limit 0.5 page)
The overall goal of this academic year was to really bolster the traditional tutoring program that had been offered at no charge each year to students in the professional phase of the program. The first step that was taken involved the development of the lead tutor system, which placed one to students in charge of a particular didactic course. The goal was that the lead tutors would be in constant contact with the course master of each subject so that tutoring could be directed more effectively at areas in which the professors felt that the students were struggling with the most. The lead tutor system was also developed with the goal of having large, effective group review sessions. In this case the lead tutors were tasked with the responsibility of setting up review sessions for their respective course that was open to all students. Ideally the lead tutors were to develop a planned review for the session that included a brief review of the course material for the exam in question as well as practice problems if applicable, ultimately followed by an open question and answer session.
Beyond tutoring one of the major goals of the chapter this year was to become more involved within the pharmacy school itself as a means to become a more recognized organization amongst the student body. The plans to achieve this goal included outreach programs such as a lecture series developed in partnership with the Beta Gamma chapter of Phi Delta Chi and involvement during the schools annual community outreach program during American Pharmacists' Month, an event that had not seen Rho Chi involvement in years past.
Activities:
Tutoring
As in years past, tutoring has remained the primary activity of the Alpha Beta Chapter for the 2014-2015 academic year. Tutoring primarily consisted of individual one-on-one tutoring sessions or small group review sessions consisting of 2 to 3 students. However several large group review sessions were offered to students in preparation for several examinations in the following courses: pharmaceutics, cardiology, infectious disease, human anatomy and physiology, and biochemistry. The large group review sessions generally consisted of 30 or more students and 3 to 5 tutors. In an effort to increase the productivity of the group reviews the large groups were broken down into smaller groups of approximately 5 to 10 students with 1 or more students leading the instruction and tutoring of the smaller groups.
A new change for this academic year was the addition of pharmacy calculations, bio-pharmaceutics, and pharmacokinetics to the tutoring schedule. Tutoring of pharmacy calculations was added to the tutoring schedule as this area of pharmacy practice has traditional given students trouble within our program over the last few years. To make tutoring the most effective in this subject we paired closely with the instructor for this part of the curriculum. The subjects of bio-pharmaceutics and pharmacokinetics were added to the tutoring schedule this year at the request of Dr. Riccardo Boni the instructor for these courses, as they had never been included on this schedule before.
Tutoring will continue to be the central activity of the chapter for the foreseeable future as the faculty and students of the program have continued to show their support and value this wonderful free service.
Pharmacy Carnival (October 7, 2014)
This event is an ongoing annual tradition within the Mylan School of Pharmacy and serves as an opportunity for student organizations to promote themselves amongst the student body of the pharmacy program. This year the Alpha Beta chapter created a tri-board presentation showcasing our tutoring program as well as offering a brief description and history of the Rho Chi society. The purpose here was to ensure that the student body was aware of their access to our esteemed tutoring program as well as to provide them with a sense of familiarity with the organization in the hopes that we could inspire younger students to set their aim at attaining the right of membership. During this event we played a game known within the school as Pokémon vs. Generic Drug Name. The purpose of this game is to see if students and faculty can identify what is a drug and what is a Pokémon based on the name written on the flash card. The game was played last year and became a hit amongst the faculty and students. This game is quite difficult stumping even the most senior of clinical faculty members at times. As an incentive to play the game winners were awarded with a Pokémon themed cupcake.
American Pharmacists’ Month Outreach Program (October 15, 2014)
For the past several years the Mylan School of Pharmacy has held a community outreach program during American Pharmacists’ Month as an opportunity to provide care to the underserved population of Pittsburgh as well as to promote the value of pharmacists as members of the health care team. This year the program was held in Market Square a central location in the business district of Pittsburgh. During the event many services were offered including blood pressure, cholesterol, and carbon monoxide screenings. In addition to screenings offered nearly all the student organizations were in attendance to provide information about various disease states and the various services that pharmacists can offer. The pinnacle of the event was our immunization clinic that offered flu shots to the majority of the public at low cost or for free to the underserved community via donated vouchers from the various pharmacy organizations. During this our chapter partnered with Phi Lambda Sigma our sister organization to operate a tent that offered games for members of the pubic to play. The game utilized once again was Pokémon vs. Generic Drug Name. Overall the patrons of the event really seemed to enjoy the game and were very excited when they could name some of their medications without even looking at the bottle. We will continue to participate in this program but hope to incorporate our involvement more with the mission statement of Rho Chi in the future.
Lecture Series (October 29, 2014).
For this project our chapter partnered with Phi Delta Chi to help improve their longstanding lecture series titled “True Life I am a Duquesne Pharmacy Professor.” The purpose of this lecture is to allow professors to come in and talk about their practice areas and research interests outside of the classroom. Generally newer faculty members are asked to present so that the lecture can serve as their introduction to the student body. For this particular lecture Dr. David Zimmerman, an emergency medicine specialist and Rho Chi alumnus, lectured on his area of practice, research, and his residency pathway. The lecture hosted about 25 students and served as a fantastic opportunity for students to learn about a wonderful faculty member and a possible career path. This partnership with Phi Delta Chi in their lecture series did not continue as that organization decided to discontinue that particular project, but with several active members belonging to both organizations we hope to collaborate on future projects together.
Pre-Professional Seminar Lecture
This was another lecture in which our chapter partnered with Phi Delta Chi along with the officers of the Class of 2018. The purpose of this lecture was to give insight to first year pre-professional students about preparation for the professional phase of the program. During this program the President of our chapter Regis Bender was in attendance to speak to the younger students about the importance of developing good study habits as well as the value of the various tutoring programs offered throughout the university, highlighting the Rho Chi operated service. This is another lecture that we hope to continue in the future with permission from the school.
Student Mentoring Program
This is an ongoing event with the Mylan School of Pharmacy. Each year the President of Rho Chi is asked to pair Rho Chi and Phi Lambda Sigma students with a faculty mentor team. These students then meet with faculty mentors and their mentees as an effort to provide a source of advice to students from their older peers. These sessions are often very fruitful as student mentees are often more comfortable talking with the Rho Chi members than they are with the older faculty members. We also provide them with an excellent source of knowledge in regards to study skills and helpful hints for navigating through the curriculum.
Student Tour (December 3, 2015)
This event was a one time event that consisted of providing a tour and having lunch with a group of high school students who were interested in studying pharmacy. For this event we paired with the Director of Admissions and Data Management for the Mylan School of Pharmacy, Mr. J. Scott Copley. During the event the Rho Chi members were asked to discuss the field of pharmacy focusing on the academic process needed to achieve a Pharm.D. During this session there were approximately 15 high school students and three teachers present. Faculty member Dr. Michael Perry also gave the visiting students a demonstration of the schools Sim Man.
Financial/ Budgeting:
All budgeting was determined and approved by the faculty advisor, Dr. David Lapinsky. Over the course of the year we held one fundraising event, which consisted of T-shirts with Rho Chi Alpha Beta Chapter in white and purple text on the front of the shirt. These t-shirts were made available to all student members as well as faculty members belonging to the society.
Initiation Function:
For the second year in a row the initiation ceremony was held during the annual APhA-ASP, Phi Lambda Sigma, and Rho Chi Society Banquet. This year the event was held in Duquesne University’s Union Ballroom on Sunday, April 19, 2015. This banquet serves as an award ceremony for all student organizations and all student organizations were represented at the event. In addition to new inductees for both Rho Chi and Phi Lambda Sigma, parents and faculty members were also in attendance to support the accomplishments of those being honored during the ceremony. Dr. Gregory Wilson, Pharm.D., Director of Clinical Pharmacy Strategy for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, offered the welcome and invocation for the ceremony. Overall the night was a huge success and served once again as wonderful opportunity to recognize the accomplishments of not only the newly inducted Rho Chi members but also for all pharmacy students.