Community Faculty

The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, School of Medicine, invites eligible physicians in our community to be part of the cadre of faculty that will educate our future physicians. Partnering with our community clinicians, strengthens our ability to accomplish our medical school vision: To be a leader in the creation of a diverse and representative workforce, the stimulation of biomedical innovation, and the delivery of patient-centered health care for the Rio Grande Valley and beyond.

As a community faculty member, you can participate in various School of Medicine efforts that help us better serve our community. You will join a unique group of medical educators who volunteer their time in any of the following opportunities:

• Admissions and Student Affairs

  The UTRGV School of Medicine interviews over 300 applicants per year for 55 seats for the incoming class. As a community faculty, you can be part of the admission committee as a screener, interviewer, and evaluator. A minimum 5-hour time commitment is requested during application season from September to February.

  As a community faculty, you can help medical students with career advising by counseling specific to your specialty, educating students about mentoring relationships, shadowing, and research opportunities, including which electives to pursue and which programs to target for residency application.

• Undergraduate Medical Education (UME)

  Community faculty can participate as facilitators in Clinical Skills helping to teach history and physical examination skills, Problem-Based Learning (PBL) leading clinical case wrap-ups as clinician experts and lecturing within PreClerkship and Clerkships courses. Community faculty can also serve on continuous quality improvement educational and clinical programming for the UME curriculum.

• Clinical Preceptor for Clerkship

  Practicing community faculty physicians can serve as a preceptor for medical students during clerkship years 3 and 4. The role of the clinical preceptor is to advance clinical skills essential for medical students’ competency in their clinical practice and the hospital setting.

• Research Mentor

  You can become a research mentor to medical students, residents, and fellows. Your role will help them to advance their research skills by aiding their research experience by facilitating their opportunity for scientific inquiry, research, and scholarship.

• Graduate Medical Education

  Community faculty can participate in our Graduate Medical Education programs by participation in the education of residents and fellows. Based on specialty expertise, the community faculty member may serve as clinical faculty and/or serve as a guest lecturer for grand rounds or other conferences for GME program didactic activities throughout the year.

Are you eligible?

Here are our expectations:

• Doctoral-level training or file-specific equivalent
• Licensed (Texas) health care provider who practices in the Rio Grande Valley

Interested?

Be prepared to:

• Upload a curriculum vitae (CV)
• Submit an online application
• Complete a background check

Community Faculty Interest Form

Benefits of a Community Faculty Appointment

Take advantage of this rewarding opportunity to educate the next generation of physicians and collaborate with other community physicians to transform the future of healthcare in the Rio Grande Valley and beyond. Appointed community faculty may receive the following benefits:

• UTRGV email address.
• UTRGV ID badge.
• Free access to services from the UTRGV School of Medicine Libraries, including access to online professional journals, print and electronic books, medical apps, document delivery, and literature searching services.
• Free access to Microsoft Office applications including MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Access, Publisher.
• Included in faculty e-communication, including Dean’s monthly newsletters and other announcements.
• Invitations to special events hosted by the UTRGV School of Medicine.
• Early notification about professional development and discounted Continuing Medical Education (CME) opportunities in the Rio Grande Valley community.
• Invitations to participate in scholarly activity at UTRGV-hosted CME events as attendee and presenter.
• Opportunity to build a recruitment pipeline of UTRGV SOM graduates into your clinic.
• Eligibility for UTRGV recreational sports complex memberships for faculty/spouse/dependents on the UTRGV Brownsville and Edinburg campuses (annual membership fee required).
• Discounts on UTRGV athletics and event tickets.
• Discounts on selected items at UTRGV Bookstore.