DUBUQUE, Iowa -- Loras College has received a $2.5 million gift commitment from a graduate, officials announced Friday.

Loras President Jim Collins said the gift from Dr. Patrick J. Lillis, a 1971 graduate, will advance strength in the health sciences and medical school preparation. The gift helps ensure even more graduates can pursue medical fields, Collins said.

Lillis received his bachelor's degree in biology from Loras and then received his medical degree at the University of Iowa in 1975. Since then, he has lived and worked in Denver, where he is a partner with Lake Loveland Dermatology and a leader in the dermatology field, officials said.

Lillis played on the Loras basketball team during his four years at the school. He is the fifth-leading all-time scorer and the third-leading all-time rebounder at Loras. He was inducted into the Loras Athletic Hall of Fame in 2002 and the Lillis Court in the Athletic and Wellness Center was named in 2011 in recognition of his financial support of the building construction. Lillis also has received the Loras Alumni Excellence Award.

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Loras College Gets $2.5 Million Gift From a Graduate

Ross University School of Medicine students have achieved a 96 percent first-time pass rate on Step 1 of the United States Medical Licensing Exam between January 1, 2012 and the end of September 2012, according to reporting by students.

Miramar, FL (PRWEB) November 09, 2012

Our students performance on USMLE Step 1 meets or exceeds the rate achieved by students in U.S. medical schools, said Dr. Joseph A. Flaherty, dean and chancellor of RUSM. This is a great testament to the quality of our students and our program.

USMLE Step 1 is designed to test the knowledge acquired during the basic science years of medical school. Graduates of international medical schools must take and pass USMLE if they want to practice in the United States. In 2011, the first-time pass rate for RUSM students was 95 percent, one percentage point higher than the rate for students in U.S. and Canadian medical schools reported in the National Board of Medical Examiners Annual Reports. Updated 2012 data on U.S. and Canadian schools is not yet available.

RUSM features an integrated organ systems-based basic science curriculum taught by faculty whose sole responsibility is the teaching and mentoring of medical students. Students build a strong foundation for USMLE Step 1 success during the four semesters spent on the Schools Dominica campus. There the students not only complete a rigorous, accelerated study in the basic sciences, but also learn in RUSMs cutting-edge anatomy and medical imaging laboratory, as well as a simulation center where students begin to develop clinical skills.

About Ross University School of Medicine

Ross University School of Medicine (RUSM), founded in 1978, is committed to educating a diverse group of skilled physicians to serve as leaders in the US healthcare system. With more than 9,000 alumni, RUSM has become an important part of healthcare education in the United States. RUSM alumni practice in virtually every medical specialty and can be found in every U.S. state. Students complete their foundational studies in Dominica, West Indies, before completing their clinical training in one of RUSMs affiliated teaching hospitals throughout the United States. RUSM is accredited by the Dominican Medical Board and the Caribbean Accreditation Authority for Education in Medicine and Other Health Professions. Over the last five years, RUSM has placed more graduates into U.S. residencies than any other medical school in the world.

Nicole Pride DeVry Medical International 732-509-4822 Email Information

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Ross University School of Medicine Students Post 96 Percent USMLE Step 1 First-Time Pass Rate To Date in 2012

There will soon be a new memorial at Science Hill High School to honor alumni who have fallen in battle, and officials at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center Friday honored those it serves prior to this Veterans Day, which is Sunday.

A ceremony was held Friday morning at the location where the memorial will be on the campus of the high school. At least 50 people attended the somber occasion.

Theresa Billings was instrumental in getting the memorial placed.

She began work on the project about a year and a half ago by contacting Jenny Brock, Johnson City School Board member, and they started this project thinking there would be a lot of money to raise, but many businesses contributed to the effort.

Billings son is a major in the Marine Corps and also a 1994 graduate of the school.

So, yes, were a military family and it makes it even more dear to us, Billings said.

Thirty-eight names will be on a wall that will be included in the memorial. The area will be known as Alumni Memorial Circle. Each class will decide what to add to the area, but certainly there will be landscaping and pavers that match the school building in addition to the wall.

This memorial will honor fallen Science Hill veterans and will be located around the flagpole in the commons area between the schools old office and auditorium. Names of veterans will be etched in panels attached to brick walls that will surround the flagpole, which will feature an alumni flag that will fly under the American flag.

Science Hills JROTC will monitor the area.

Brock said she was already looking for a project to bring the alumni of Science Hill together when Billings approached her with this idea.

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SHHS, VAMC pay tribute to veterans

Haitian Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe received the distinguished alumni award from Barry University late Saturday.

The Haitian leader said his experience at the school was one filled with discipline and perseverance when he studied political science and French there.

I never thought that I would become prime minister after I graduated, he said. I wondered what was next and whether I would find a job.

Lamothe, who came to the private university to compete on the tennis team, graduated from the school in 1996.

Born in Port-au-Prince, Lamothe lost when he first tried out for team.

Very badly, he said at a news conference before receiving the award. But the coach gave me an opportunity and I seized it.

Lamothe became the first mens tennis player to be named an All-American at the school and he represented Haiti in the Davis Cup in 1994 and 1995.

He later went on to St. Thomas University to earn an MBA.

Before joining President Michel Martellys government in Haiti, he worked mostly as an entrepreneur in the telecommunications industry.

Lamothe has previously said he wanted to reignite reconstruction and promote Haiti as an investment destination.

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Haitian Prime Minister receives alumni award

Staff from Southeastern Technical College had their work commended at a public relations conference on Hilton Head Island, S.C., on Oct. 21-24.

The National Council on Marketing and Public Relations (NCMPR) held its District II conference on Hilton Head over four days, culminating in an awards dinner that saw STC public relations staff receive NCMPRs Medallion Award for their work on the schools medical programs booklet.

Even though we try to do a lot of our recruitment efforts electronically during this day and time, I decided last year that we should create another booklet and a video highlighting our medical programs, said Barry Dotson, vice president for student affairs. I didn't want it to just repeat the course information in our catalog and on our websiteI also wanted it to tell the stories of some of our amazing medical graduates.

Southeastern Techs health science alumni include department managers, directors, and other high-level employees in regional facilities like Meadows Regional Medical Center and Optim Medical Center-Tattnall, so locating subjects for the stories wasnt difficult.

So, I sketched out my ideas on a piece of paper, and passed it along to the incredible team of Krysta Rushing and Clarke Schwabe, and the result was a medical booklet that got second place in the NCMPR District II Medallion Awards in the Wild Card category, said Dotson.

The scoring system used by the NCMPR judges does not necessitate the awarding of gold, silver, and bronze, and the highest medal awarded in the Wild Card category was a silver. So, STCs medical booklet actually tied them for top honors in the category with three other schools.

The NCMPR District II encompasses 11 southern states and that is a lot of technical and community colleges, so I'm very proud of this award, said Dotson.

I'm very proud of Krysta and Clarke and the months of hard work they put into this booklet and the accompanying video. I'm also extremely proud of the graduates highlighted and the fact that Southeastern Technical College was able to change their lives forever.

To view the accompanying video to the award-winning medical booklet, visit http://www.youtube.com/SoutheasternTechColl. To find out more about Southeastern Technical College and its medical programs, call 912-538-3100 or 478-289-2200 or visit http://www.southeasterntech.edu.

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Southeastern Tech awarded for Medical Programs Publication

The Parkway School District's Alumni Association will induct its fifth class into the Parkway Alumni Association Hall of Fame.

The Nov. 17 event will feature a reception and induction dinner at 5:30 p.m. at the Sheraton Westport Hotel - Lakeside Chalet, 900 West Port Plaza in Maryland Heights.

Reservations for tickets to the event, which cost $75, are required by Nov. 1 and can be made by calling the association at (314) 415-8074 or visiting http://www.parkwayalumni.org.

The Hall of Fame inductees have distinguished themselves in various areas and made significant contributions in their respective fields.

The 2012 inductees are:

Chandra Brown (Parkway West High, Class of 1986), vice president of Oregon Ironworks, L.L.C., and president of its new subsidiary company, United Streetcar, Inc.

David Brown (Parkway West High, Class of 1981), an awardwinning communications professional at WCVBTV in Boston.

Jeffrey Burke (Parkway South High, Class of 1988), an assistant professor of psychiatry at the Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic at the University of Pittsburghs School of Medicine.

Bryan Chapell (Parkway West High, Class of 1972), chancellor of Covenant Seminary in St. Louis.

Robert Clark (Parkway Central High, Class of 1977), the founder, chairman and CEO of Clayco, Inc., a real estate development, engineering, architecture and construction company.

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Parkway to induct fifth class of distinguished alumni

RAYNHAM, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Medrobotics, an emerging medical robotics company developing the innovative Flex Robotic System, announced today the appointment of Eugene N. Myers, M.D., and Marshall Strome, M.D., two thought-leaders in the field of head and neck surgery, as co-chairmen of the Companys worldwide Medical Advisory Board.

The Flex Robotic System is designed to provide hospitals with a costeffective, multipurpose surgical platform so they can offer patients and surgeons a new, minimally-invasive treatment alternative for disease in difficult-to-access anatomical locations, starting with transoral applications in the oropharynx and larynx, said Samuel Straface, Ph.D., president and CEO of Medrobotics. We are extremely excited to have Dr. Myers and Dr. Strome, two exceptional surgeons, lead our worldwide Medical Advisory Board as we prepare to make our first product available to leading head and neck surgeons, added Dr. Straface.

Dr. Eugene N. Myers is Distinguished Professor and Emeritus Chair of the Department of Otolaryngology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. He has written 259 articles and has published many books, the most notable of which is Cancer of the Head and Neck together with Dr. James Y. Suen, now considered the standard textbook on this topic. Dr. Myers serves on many editorial boards throughout the world and was International Editor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery. I am excited to participate in making this important technology available to surgeons and their patients, whose treatment options currently are often limited and not well tolerated, said Dr. Myers.

Dr. Marshall Strome is the immediate past Professor and Chairman of the Cleveland Clinic Head and Neck Institute. In 1998, Dr. Strome performed the worlds first total human laryngeal transplant; and in 2005, he performed the worlds first robotic laser excision of a laryngeal malignancy. In addition to more than 200 publications and several books, Dr Strome was one of a select group of physicians recognized at the millennium by the American Academy of Otolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery for their contributions to medicine in the last 250 years. Ive had the privilege of working with the Medrobotics team throughout the development process, and am pleased to formalize my role with the company as the Flex Robotic System is introduced to the eagerly awaiting ENT community, said Dr. Strome.

The initial application of the Flex Robotic System will address a compelling unmet need for minimally invasive treatment options for the approximately 200,000 patients diagnosed with head and neck cancer each year in the U.S. and Europe, and many more with significant benign disease. The Flex Robotic System is anticipated to be commercially available in 2013 in the U.S. and Europe. Additional applications in other difficult-to-access anatomical locations in the body are already under development.

About Eugene N. Myers MD, FACS, FRCS Edin. (Hon)

Dr. Myers is Distinguished Professor and Emeritus Chair of the Department of Otolaryngology of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. The department has always been in the top tier in the nation in U.S. News & World Report.

Dr. Myers is acknowledged as one of the top Head and Neck surgeons worldwide. He has written 259 articles and has published many books, the most notable of which is Cancer of the Head and Neck together with Dr. James Y. Suen now considered the standard textbook on this topic. Dr. Myers serves on many editorial boards throughout the world and was International Editor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery. He is also an Honorary Member of more than 20 national societies and was Principal Investigator of the Oral Cancer Center of Discovery funded by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research.

Dr. Myers is Past President of the American Board of Otolaryngology, the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, the American Laryngological Association, the American Head and Neck Society, and the Pan American Association of Otorhinolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery.

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Distinguished Head & Neck Surgeons Eugene Myers, M.D., and Marshall Strome, M.D., Appointed Co-Chairs of Medrobotics ...