Unbeknownst to me, my name somehow came up as the “Stanford Medical Student Association First-Year Rep” due to several members of my class. A couple hours and a rousing 30-second speech later (announcing my past experience as “high school secretary” and “vice president of my dorm”), I was running for the position and was somehow elected.

It was just the opportunity my classmates were waiting for; immediately requests came in from virtually nowhere. “New ping-pong paddles!” “A Playstation 2 for the student lounge!” “The new curriculum is messed up!” “I was overcharged on my student account!”

I’ve now collected my class’s concerns (from the financial to the funny), and I’m ready to throw my political weight around the ring. There are definitely issues that need to be addressed, or at least voiced–some of the new curriculum is better than the old, with more clinical correlations and early clinical exposure. But other parts definitely need work. To the administration’s credit, some of the changes have been made quickly: our Histology class was an absolute mess the first week, but the confusion’s been cleared up, and we’re back on track. We’ve got a class called “Practice of Medicine” that’s pretty hit-or-miss at this point; it’s seemingly a lump of classes that don’t fit anywhere else, but are generally important, things like nutrition, cultural competency, computer skills, quantitative analysis and biostatistics. Each “thread” as they’re calling it is taught by a different instructor, and we’re all fairly confused about where to go, what to read, and who to contact. As first years in a small class (86 of us), we of course follow the “herding cattle” style of decision making: one person, who appears to know the way to the next class, leads, and the rest follow. Same applies for information about classes. When one person gets some snippet of information about a class, test, or quiz, it’s instantly disseminated (with 25% accuracy) to the rest of the class. It’s seriously an adult version of the “Telephone” game. If there are any social scientists or personal networks academics out there, we’re worth a dissertation or two; we’ve got Friendster beat anyday.

If there’s one thing I can applaud Stanford for, it’s our class’s diversity. Diversity was a big buzzword at my alma mater , but I don’t think I really ever understood the concept or appreciated it until I came here to California. In our class we’ve got a little bit of everything–and I think it really reflects California itself. I was in Wal-Mart the other day and heard a little girl switching between English and Spanish like the two were the same language; at Ikea I heard more non-English than I heard English, and on the bus I took yesterday, I was the only white guy. Coming from Chicago it’s different. And coming from Kansas , it’s a whole other world here.

Our class is fairly unified as far as I can tell; we haven’t cliqued off yet, everyone’s invited to parties and get-togethers, and we all have a merry old time. Everyone’s very mellow and relaxed, which is just what I need to help keep the overly-anal side of me at bay. You can be as social or as anti-social as you want, and nobody bats an eye.

And on that note, I should probably get off this computer and either go a) socialize or b) study.

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