Department of Medicine

The Vermont Medical Society’s Education and Research Foundation (VMSERF) has awarded $5,000 scholarships to Larner College of Medicine at the University of Vermont students Margaret Johnston and Andrew Corse.  The recipients were honored at the Vermont Medical Society’s 204th annual meeting held November 4, 2017 in Woodstock, Vt.

Each year VMSERF gives one or more scholarships to medical students who are committed to practicing medicine in Vermont and caring for Vermonters. The scholarship program was created to encourage young doctors to return to Vermont after completing their residency training and is named in honor of Mildred Reardon, M.D., professor emerita of medicine at the Larner College of Medicine at UVM, who was instrumental in forming the foundation.

A member of the Class of 2019, Corse has worked his way north from Georgia, to Massachusetts and then Vermont, which he now considers home.

During his time here in this state he participated in a public health project with Vermont CARES – working to evaluate the efficacy of syringe exchange programs – that convinced him of the need for expanded syringe exchange programs in the state and spurred his interest in pursuing a profession in psychiatry in Vermont so that he can help the state battle its drug addiction problem.

Corse earned BAs in both neuroscience and psychology at Boston University, where he was on the Dean’s List and graduate magna cum laude while earning the Psychology Department Award for Service. Locally, he served as assistant director of the Champlain Valley Area Health Education Center, where he taught clinical workshops at a camp for high school students interested in science careers.

Two experiences in particular led native Vermonter Johnston to pursue a career in medicine in Vermont: serving as a 16-year old member of the Vergennes Area Rescue Squad – where she learned that she didn’t like having to turn patients over to someone else once she delivered them to the hospital – and the early exposure she gained to biology and the Vermont way of life while working the greenhouse of her father’s Vergennes apple orchard and nursery.

After graduating from Muhlenberg College in Pennsylvania with a degree in biology, Johnston yearned to return to her roots and her beloved Vermont, a dream that came true upon her acceptance as a member of the Class of 2019.

Since her matriculation, she has demonstrated her commitment to rural health care in our state by requesting rotations at Middlebury Pediatrics and Little City Family Practice in Vergennes.   

Additionally, Margaret is the recipient of the Freeman Scholarship, Helen and Phyllis Wasserman Phorplus Prize and the McGraw-Hill’s LANGE Medical Student Award.  

The scholarship is funded through generous contributions from the University of Vermont Medical Center, members of the Vermont Medical Society, and the Chittenden County Medical Society.

About the Vermont Medical Society: The Vermont Medical Society is the leading voice of physicians in the state and is dedicated to advancing the practice of medicine by advocating on behalf of Vermont’s doctors and the patients and communities they care for. The Society serves its 2,000 members through public policy advocacy on the state and federal levels, as well as by providing legal, administrative and educational support, producing a rich flow of news and information and offering member benefits that increase medical practice effectiveness and efficiency. For more information, visit www.VTMD.org.

(This article was adapted from a press release produced by Justin Campfield of ThinkSpark Media for the Vermont Medical Society.)