Welcome to Alpha Omega Alpha!
Alpha Omega Alpha, commonly referred to as AΩA, can be thought of as the “Phi Beta Kappa for medical schools.” As the only national honor medical society, its mission, developed over the past one hundred years, has been to recognize and enhance professionalism, academic excellence, service, and leadership within the profession.
Criteria for and restrictions upon election to AΩA are detailed in the Constitution. These elections occur each year in the 124 chapters within the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, and the American University of Beirut. In 2006, similar to other recent years, close to 3100 medical students and a much smaller number of faculty, resident, and alumni members were elected. Since its founding in 1902, more than 100,000 members have been added to the rolls.
One basic premise of the Society is that election to AΩA is not only a capstone of a student’s medical school career, but an obligation, both in his or her own personal life as a physician and as a dues-paying member of AΩA, to support the principled ideals set forth so effectively and lastingly by the founders throughout life. As is outlined below, programs for medical students are offered to each chapter and are funded by the national office of Alpha Omega Alpha. In addition, AΩA publishes an illustrated non-technical quarterly that is distributed to each dues paying member. Named The Pharos, the journal contains material on medical history, ethics, national issues, personal essays, and poems.
A national office of six staff that includes the Executive Secretary and Assistant Treasurer of AΩA is located in Menlo Park, CA. The staff reports to a Board of Directors, fifteen in number including several students, which is responsible for development of all policies, constitutional changes, and funding mechanisms. The national office is linked to each chapter at member medical schools where a faculty member is designated AΩA councilor by each school dean to supervise chapter activities and to assure that elections are done effectively and within constitutional guidelines. At present, only three medical schools (UC San Diego, the University of Connecticut, and Mayo Medical School) have never had a chapter of AΩA. Both Harvard and Stanford had chapters established in the early part of the last century, but chapters at both institutions have become inactive in the past twenty years.
Several schools with no active chapter have developed AΩA Associations formed of members (faculty or community physicians) elected previously at other schools. These Associations cannot elect students, but can elect residents, faculty, and alumni in numbers prescribed by the constitution. In addition, these Associations are eligible to request and receive funds from the national office to support the programs of the society that are open to all students at the school.
When a new medical school is founded and approved by the Liason Committee on Medical Education, the Dean and faculty members elected previously at other institutions have the option to apply for AΩA chapter status. These requests are evaluated closely by the Executive Secretary and Board. A site visit to the applicant school by the Executive Secretary and a member of the Board will occur and a recommendation forwarded for full Board action.
I urge you to explore our web site, whose various pages will tell you so much about the organization to which you have been elected and for which we ask your suport. In addition to learning how to submit manuscripts for review for publication in The Pharos, our non-technical quarterly, you can review the locations of and councilors at our 124 chapters and get details about the many programs available to medical schools and chapters, ranging from support of Visiting Professors to the chapters/schools, to the Medical Student Service Projects sponsored by each chapter but available for application by any group of students at the medical school. Each year each dean and councilor can nominate a student who, with a prospective faculty mentor, has prepared an application for a $4000 AΩA research fellowship, usually carried out during the ten weeks of opportunity between the first and second years of school.
You will be asked to register online to assure and finalize your membership in AΩA. Perhaps you have already done so. Within the next several years it will be a monetary savings for you to take up Lifetime Membership that guarantees your receipt of each issue of The Pharos several other perquisites and receipt of no annual dues notices! It is your dues and those of others that are the only source of funding for all the programs sponsored by the national office for medical students and the AΩA chapters…so please pay your dues and keep us updated on any changes of address.
More information about AΩA can be found on the following pages:
History
Organization
Individual chapter web sites
Resources (a compilation of all the documents available on the site)
Gift store (including ties and books)
Articles from The Pharos
National and chapter news (archived)
Information about ordering additional keys and certificates (for members)
With warm regards,
Edward D. Harris, Jr., M.D.
Executive Secretary
Alpha Omega Alpha
Editor, The Pharos