Vision Statement

Our Vision

Charles Sturt University School of Rural Medicine will be recognised as one of the leading medical schools in Australia and the preferred provider of rural medical school training.

Mission

Our mission is to enable rural Australians including First Nations people to study medicine and pursue a career as a medical practitioner. We aim for our graduates to be doctors with a rural commitment and perspective, who provide the highest quality and compassionate care to their patients and contribute to healthier rural communities.  We aim to become an internationally recognised medical school leading rural health research, and our students’ and school’s research will have significant and demonstrable impacts on rural health outcomes.

Strategy

We aim to “train locals, locally” and to provide:

  • Early exposure to rural and remote clinical placements, general practice and rural generalism.
  • Longitudinal rural generalist placements leading to greater connections to a rural community and stronger understanding of the unique attributes of each community.
  • Alignment with rural prevocational and vocational training pipelines.
  • Alignment of training with community and health service needs.
  • A program that cultivates resilience and produces graduates with practical skills to work in rural communities.
  • Innovation in our approach to rural medical education.

Objectives

  1. Graduate students with a rural perspective and understanding of the challenges of rural medicine.
  2. Provide rural, disadvantaged, low socioeconomic and First Nations people the opportunity to study medicine in a rural environment closer to home or where they intend to work longer term.
  3. Train medical graduates to help address the rural and First Nations medical workforce shortage and advocate for initiatives to support rural healthcare.
  4. Train medical students to become familiar with individual community health needs.
  5. Provide a positive educational environment where diversity is embraced, and a commitment to excellence is fostered.
  6. Produce research of excellence that addresses local community needs.
  7. Contribute to rural health research capacity building.