Message from the Head of School

Dear colleagues,

I hope you are keeping well and enjoying the wonderful weather spring has brought us. It has been a busy few months at the School, and I would like to take a moment to reflect on some of the exciting initiatives that have taken place since my last update.

It was great to see many of our key health service and institute partners come together for an engaging discussion for our MMS Planning Meeting in July. Professor Frédéric Hollande and Professor Liz Molloy led a session on cross-disciplinary learning and teaching collaborations, while David Bowering facilitated a session with the Medical School’s partners to discuss the draft proposal of our Strategic Foundation work for MMS. The School Executive team look forward to sharing the outcomes with our broader community over the coming months.

This year’s MD Student Conference was another great success. It was an honour to witness more than 1,300 Doctor of Medicine students across all year levels of the program come together for this event, which was delivered in person for the first time since 2019. I would like to recognise the tremendous effort and hard work of the entire student-led team. It was a joy to see so many students explore facets of medicine not covered by the curriculum, and enjoy some fun activities and networking opportunities.

Lastly, I encourage you to attend one of the Faculty’s Town Hall events hosted by our Dean, Professor Jane Gunn AO. These Town Halls aim to discuss how our faculty can extend upon Advancing Health 2030, asking what we need to do now to prepare for—and participate in—changes to the health and biomedical landscape over the next 20 years.

Best wishes,

Professor Nicola Lautenschlager
Head of the Melbourne Medical School