The University of Melbourne Medical Students’ Society (UMMSS) is the official representative body for all (1400+) medical students at the University of Melbourne.
Every medical school in Australia has its own medical student’s society. In contrast to student societies in other courses, you’ll find that med societies form an integral part of the many aspects of your time at medical school.
Being a medical student at UoM automatically makes you an UMMSS member for the duration of your degree, at no cost. UMMSS exists to maximise your experience at the Melbourne Medical School in a number of ways:
Academic
Our Academic team organises a program of events throughout the year including information nights, networking events, a comprehensive Peer Tutoring program, and a series of masterclasses tailored for each year level.
Advocacy
We play a key role in representing the interests of our members, both to the Medical School and to external groups. We meet with the Medical School regularly, and represent students’ interests at many faculty meetings, with the scope of these meetings including curriculum development, delivery, and feedback. We are also strongly engaged with external groups such as the Australian Medical Students’ Association (AMSA).
Social
Medicine has no shortage of wise sayings, but one that medical students in particular live by is “Work hard, play hard(er)”. The UMMSS social calendar will be one of the highlights of your time in the MD course. We’ll kick-start this with Med Camp the week before the course begins, the MD1 Welcome Lunch during Induction Week, followed by the first PFA (“Pleasant Friday Afternoon”) of the year – social events which have become long-standing traditions of UMMSS. Other highlights include the Grand Medical Ball and the annual Boat Cruise.
Wellbeing
Our Community and Wellbeing team organises a program of events which provides a great platform for engagement and awareness of issues such as mental health and student wellbeing. Highlights including battling it out for your clinical school in the annual ‘Vampire Cup’ blood donation drive, Movember, and interclinical school sports events. The Peer Mentoring program links students to colleagues in higher year levels, who volunteer to check-in and provide support and advice to ease the transition to medical school, and later on, into learning in the clinical environment.
Engagement
UMMSS provides support to a large number of medical student interest groups which are more or less related to medicine, including Medleys the Med Revue, the Surgical Students’ Society of Melbourne (SSSM), the Melbourne University Medics Paediatrics Society (MUMPS), MD Queer, and many others.
UMMSS itself also offers a huge number of opportunities for its members to gain experience and skills in whatever their areas of interest, including representative positions, committee and subcommittee roles, which encompass skills such as advocacy, logistics, publications and promotions, and more!