The Visiting Student Hardship Scholarship program is a funded opportunity for fourth-year medical students interested in completing an externship in Emergency Medicine. The program is designed to give students that are facing financial challenges the opportunity to gain clinical exposure to Emergency Medicine in our tertiary care adult and children’s hospitals. In addition, the rotation will introduce students to our EM family and allow them to experience what Gainesville has to offer. This 4-week opportunity is offered during the months of June through October. Externships are four weeks in duration and are available to students that meet the requirements of the University of Florida College of Medicine.
UFHealth Shands is an academic university hospital that sees approximately 100,000 adult and 30,000 pediatric emergency department visits annually. We are a Level I Trauma Center, AHA/ASA Comprehensive Stroke Center, ACC Accredited Chest Pain Center, and ACS Verified Burn Center. Our patient acuity is high: 35% arrive by EMS, 3% are triaged as ESI-1, and 4.1% require critical care. Students will have the opportunity to work at our adult and pediatric sites with our talented faculty and residents. In addition to clinical work, they will join in weekly resident conference, medical student only teaching sessions in our state-of-the-art Center for Experiential Learning and Simulation (CELS), and complete a ride along with our local EMS service.
The Award includes:
- $1000 stipend for travel and living expenses, plus additional funding for lodging/rotation costs.
- Mentorship
- Career advising from the clerkship director and EM resident medical student liaisons
- Departmental standardized letter of evaluation (SLOE) upon request
- Interview offer with our residency program
Application Requirements
The program is open to all applicants who are experiencing financial hardships that have created a barrier to obtaining an externship in Emergency Medicine.
Eligibility requirements:
- Final year of medical school at an LCME-accredited medical school
- Good standing in medical school
- Completion of third year of medical school upon date of attendance
- Applying for residency position in emergency medicine
To apply for The Visiting Student Hardship Scholarship please complete the application below. You will be asked to enter/upload the additional application requirements through this application:
- Brief explanation of why this scholarship will be beneficial to your financial situation (150 words or less)
- Letter of interest as to why you are seeking a rotation at the University of Florida Gainesville Department of Emergency Medicine (500 words or less)
- CV/resume
- USMLE Step 1 or COMLEX
Rotation dates with opportunity available:
- Period 2: June 9- July 6, 2025
- Period 3: July 7- August 3, 2025
- Period 4: August 4- August 31, 2025
- Period 5: September 1- September 28, 2025
- Period 6: September 29- October 26, 2025
Questions?
For questions and additional information, please contact our Clerkship Director, Dr. Ronnie Ren (renr@ufl.edu), and our Clerkship Coordinator, Hayden Evans (evanss1@ufl.edu)