Summer Internship

Externship

The Anderson Orthopaedic Clinic Externship program offers an eight-week immersive summer program for college students and exceptional high school students who want an in-depth exposure to academic orthopaedic surgery. More than just shadowing, this program is designed to provide a complete educational experience including research experience, one-on-one mentorship and direct exposure to clinical medicine.

Each summer extern is assigned to a member of our faculty who will serve as his or her preceptor for the duration of the eight-week experience. The externship is broken up into two important components; shadowing and research.

Shadowing would take place across all clinical settings including outpatient clinics, in the operating room and in the hospital, allowing for exposure to patient care in a variety of settings. You are encouraged to really engage and become a part of your mentor’s orthopaedic care team during the program.

The research component would take place in tandem to the shadowing experience. Each summer extern is required to participate in a scholarly activity. The intent is that your project would eventually go on to publication in a national journal or presentation at a national conference. You would work closely with your mentor to design and carry out a research question in orthopaedics that you are passionate about.

This program is designed to be more than just a simple shadowing experience. The research and educational opportunities will set you ahead of your peers and enhance your college or medical school application. It is also a chance to explore a specialty, which can help you establish your field of study early in your education allowing you to jump start your career into that field.

While the traditional program involves a formal 8 weeks, many of our mentees have gone on to form lasting relationships with our physicians that have led to longer-term internship and research opportunities including multiple research publications. Many of our past mentees have successfully gone on to medical school and some have even become practicing orthopaedic surgeons.

Program details:

This program is intended for college students and rising high school juniors who are interested in discovering more about the real-world practice of orthopaedics and exploring their interests by developing and participating in a research project intended for publication in scientific journals. We particularly encourage those who have a specific research question or area of interest to apply. In your application, please state your research idea. Ideas and questions that our admission team finds relevant and timely as well as manageable and able to be started and close to completion by the end of the 8 weeks will be given preference.

A limited number of grants of $2,500 for a new research project may be available through a student research and education grant. The grant application process would be started with your chosen mentor after acceptance into the program. If the grant is not awarded to a particular student who has been accepted into our program, the student can continue to work on the project with their mentor as an unpaid extern.

If you do not have a specific research question or project, or do not want to go through the grant process, we may have ongoing projects just waiting for an engaged student to take ownership of and see through publication.

Application Timeline:

Applications open: (immediately). Please fill out and attach all requested forms and documents

Grant application deadline: May 1st

Notification of grant status: May 15th

Program begins: June 12th

Summer student symposium: August 4th

Program ends: August 4th.

Anderson Clinic Summer Internship.