How We Engage
Our students, faculty, and staff are committed to reducing health disparities in our communities through volunteerism, mentorship and education programs. Follow your passion for service and you can join student-led community outreach initiatives like these.
Root Cause
Root Cause is a monthly health and public services fair that aims to provide access to health care and education to those in our neighboring community. This initiative is led by UofSC School of Medicine Greenville students, in partnership with School of Medicine Greenville faculty and staff, Prisma Health team members, and community partners.
Julie Valentine Christmas Drive
In partnership with Alpha Omega Alpha (AOA), students, faculty, and staff at the USC School of Medicine Greenville donate Christmas gifts to families of the Julie Valentine Center, a local center that provides free, confidential services to sexual assault and child abuse survivors and their families.
Service Oriented Interest Groups
The Community Outreach Committee, led by UofSC School of Medicine Greenville students, organizes volunteers for a variety of community outreach activities to engage with Greenville and the Upstate. Organizations that fall within the Community Outreach Committee include:
We are a group of medical students who are committed to providing adaptive athletes with a welcoming and supportive running community in a safe and enjoyable environment. We are supported by physicians certified in Lifestyle Medicine as well as other faculty members at USC SOMG. We have no restrictions of pace, distance, or mode of movement. We compete as a team in local races, and practice together throughout the year.
GFMC provides medical and dental care, health education, and prescriptions without charge to low-income, uninsured Greenville County residents. Medical students serve the clinic by triaging patients, taking vitals, serving as interpreters, and assisting the clinic with various other tasks as needed. Visit the Greenville Free Medical Clinic website for more information.
The goal of the Health Outreach Initiative is to educate local middle and high school students on health topics and careers to facilitate a better understanding of health information, improve health literacy, and improve the overall health of the Upstate. Medical students visit local schools monthly to educate students on common diseases, such as heart attacks or diabetes, and how they can intervene if an emergency occurs. Similarly, we incorporate activities about their own bodies in order to empower them to take an active role in maintaining good health throughout their lives. Additionally, we provide information about various career paths in health care, such as nursing and EMS, in an effort to promote a future generation of diverse and outstanding health care providers.
The Juvenile Detention Center in Greenville works to provide youth who have committed a crime a safe, secure, and productive environment while they await adjudication, disposition, or placement. As a volunteer group, we aim to educate the youth about a variety of topics from exercise fitness, nutrition, first aid, hygiene, and many more while providing them with a fun and interactive afternoon. The group volunteers at the center for an hour every two weeks.
The Greenville branch of FoodShare is a non-profit dedicated to providing fresh produce to underserved members of the community at a reduced price by packing and delivering food boxes to various locations in Greenville. People of the community place their orders online and receive food boxes filled with produce two times per month. Our student volunteers help prep food boxes, pack boxes with produce, and/or assist in delivering the boxes. These volunteer opportunities are available every other week, and volunteers can help out as often as they would like. Additionally, medical students and faculty are able to sign up to receive food boxes.
The Medical Roots Garden creates a space for students, faculty, and staff to cultivate an organic garden, build the medical community, and emphasize the school’s value of applying lifestyle medicine to one’s practice. Our student-run community garden, located on campus, is a place where students and faculty work together to learn about planting, while maintaining and harvesting seasonal fruits and vegetables. We hope to share our skills and knowledge in the garden with other community members in order to promote healthy lifestyles complete with fresh nutritious produce available to the UofSC SOMG community.
Mentor Upstate is a school mentoring program whose goal is to “support as many children as possible through positive, real one-on-one relationships.” The majority of UofSC SOMG students volunteer at Hollis Elementary and are assigned an elementary school student of the same gender to eat lunch with once a week. This opportunity truly allows our students to develop a relationship with those who might not otherwise have a mentor.
The Positive Exposure Zone seeks to support, encourage and enlighten medical students to become empathetic and compassionate health care providers. Utilizing Positive Exposure multimedia education, the arts, and community involvement, the Positive Exposure Zone of the UofSC School of Medicine Greenville creates innovative opportunities for physicians in training to see beyond a diagnosis, celebrating the humanity of our patients. Please visit the Positive Exposure website for more information.
We are the UofSCSOMG Campus Chapter of Remote Area Medical (RAM). RAM is a national non-profit organization founded in 1985 that organizes weekend-long clinics that provide high-quality free medical, dental, and vision services to anyone in attendance. They work with local host groups to address health care disparities in their communities and equip these communities with the strategies and resources necessary to confront these issues head-on. As the UofSCSOMG Chapter of RAM, we are working to organize a weekend-long RAM clinic here in the Upstate. By custom-making glasses and dentures on site, proving dental cleanings and extractions, and offering specialty medical services and health screenings completely free of charge, we believe that we will help to prevent pain and alleviate suffering in the surrounding community by bringing in resources that help to fill a gap in terms of what services are currently offered to uninsured and low-income families. We plan on hosting an Upstate SC RAM Clinic in the next 12 months, which will require a large student volunteer involvement. We plan on raising awareness for other RAM clinics throughout the Southeast and getting UofSCSOMG students plugged in to volunteer opportunities at these clinics.
To find out more, visit https://www.ramusa.org/.
The goal of the Rural Medicine Interest Group (RMIG) is to generate interest in rural medicine within the student body of USCSOMG while promoting current and future opportunities within rural medicine to students. Examples of activities include physician panels, educational L & L, volunteer opportunities, and social events.