PLS chapter wins national leadership challenge grant

Phi Lambda Sigma—Beta Beta chapter cabinet

The UCSF School of Pharmacy student chapter of the national pharmacy leadership society, Phi Lambda Sigma (PLS), has won the organization’s 2012 Charles Thomas Leadership Challenge Grant to support a campus project.

Student pharmacist Caroline Lindsay, president of the School’s Beta Beta Chapter, accepted the award on the chapter’s behalf on March 10 at the PLS Awards Reception at the annual meeting of the American Pharmacists Association in New Orleans.

Also on hand was Tina Brock, BSPharm, MSPH, EdD, associate dean of teaching and learning, who is a co-advisor of the School chapter along with Candy Tsourounis, PharmD, a faculty member in the Department of Clinical Pharmacy.

The challenge topic for this year’s grant was “Leadership in the Age of Social Networking.” The UCSF chapter leaders proposed training members and fellow students to create online professional portfolios using tools at portfolio.ucsf.edu [link defunct]. The portfolios can be reviewed by mentors for feedback, then shared with recruiters.

Aided by the $1,000 grant, the campus chapter will organize a May workshop to train dozens of student pharmacist leaders on how to appropriately and effectively use the UCSF portfolio system as well as other social networking. Those leaders will, in turn, train classmates during the chapter’s regular career development sessions (resume workshops and CV matchups) as well as recruiting alumni to act as mentors and review the online portfolios. (Alumni interested in helping as portfolio mentors please contact [email protected])

The chapter’s grant application indicated the UCSF system is open source software that could be adopted by others nationally. It also noted that online portfolios can be used by students during their first years in school seeking internships and continue to be used throughout their careers.

The PLS mission is to promote leadership qualities among pharmacy students. Student chapter members are chosen via applications (including an essay, CV submission, and peer nomination) from second-, third- and fourth-year pharmacy students.


About the School: The UCSF School of Pharmacy aims to solve the most pressing health care problems and strives to ensure that each patient receives the safest, most effective treatments. Our discoveries seed the development of novel therapies, and our researchers consistently lead the nation in NIH funding. The School’s doctor of pharmacy (PharmD) degree program, with its unique emphasis on scientific thinking, prepares students to be critical thinkers and leaders in their field.