University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

COSMIC Clinical & Community Leadership Curriculum

Partnership Education Action Project (PEAK)

The COSMIC Clinical & Community Leadership Curriculum (CLC) is a leadership and community engagement curriculum woven into the Colorado Springs Branch longitudinal integrated clerkship. The CLC explores leadership skills essential to the team-based healthcare delivery model of the 21st century and to the various venues—administrative, clinical, and civic—where physicians are called upon to lead.

The CLC’s lessons are explored via the Partnership Education Action Project (PEAK), a longitudinal team-based service-learning project that challenges students to apply the CLC’s leadership lessons to impact local community health. While much of medical training emphasizes the singular relationship between patient and physician, the PEAK Project shifts the lens to consider a physician’s relationship to his or her community. This leadership-in-action project provides a forum for students to develop self-awareness of their leadership and communication styles, build authentic community partnerships, and hone their emerging professional voice.

PEAK Teams consist of two to four medical students working collaboratively with a local organization to address a community need. Community partners include—but are not limited to—the Mission Medical Center, Therapeutic Recreation, The Resource Exchange, Urban Peak, InsideOut Youth Services, School District 11, and El Paso County Health.

Each PEAK Team is assigned a “Community Engagement Preceptor” (CEP) who holds a leadership role in the partnering community organization. The CEP is aware of our curricular goals, timeline, and scope of the PEAK project; they work closely with our medical students to collaborate on the development and implementation of a project relevant to their organization’s mission.

Please contact Dr. Heather Cassidy with questions: Heather.cassidy@ucdenver.edu