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The Candle Award

The Candle Award
The "Candle Award" is both a symbol and an acronym for those individuals who help light the way for medical students and embody the traits we wish to recognize: Caring, Advocating, Nurturing, Determination, Leadership, and Empathy. It is an award given by Vanderbilt medical students to those individuals who have sacrificially devoted themselves to teaching and mentoring. Recipients of this award will be nominated and chosen based upon their positive impact on the lives of physicians-in-training, and are recognized by their students as examples of excellence in medical education.

Who is eligible for this award? - basic science faculty, residents, attendings, nurses, dieticians, or other individuals who have been nominated by you for devotion and extraordinary service towards your medical education. While those individuals who repeatedly stand out by winning major teaching awards are eligible, the CANDLE award hopes to recognize those individuals who may not have the opportunity to interact with many students, but are outstanding in their own right.

Those individuals selected to be CANDLE award recipients will be recognized by having their picture and anonymous student quote in the Reporter (please be aware an excerpt from your nomination may be used in the Reporter) and the presentation of a white coat pin during an appropriate peer gathering, such as Grand Rounds or teaching conference. Recipients may not win this award more than one time a year, and nominations will be continuously reconsidered for the award one calendar year from the date of nomination. Also, the nominating student(s) may no longer be in the class/service or have a grade/evaluation still pending from the nominee during the time the award is presented.

Please email me with any further questions you may have. Thanks for your nomination!

Blake Niederhauser, VMS Class of 2008

Click here to nominate a faculty member, house staff, or other health care professional.

Click here for eligibility information.

Here are the past recipients of the award:

Alex Parikh 1/2008 Assistant Professor of Surgery
Kyla Terhune 11/2007 Fellow in Critical Care
Dr. Ellen Clayton 9/2007 Professor of Pediatrics and Professor of Law
Dr. Derek Riebau 8/2007 Assistant Professor of Neurology
Dr. Waldon Garriss III 6/2007 Associate Professor of Internal Medicine and Pediatrics
Dr. Alfred Mansour 5/2007 Resident in Orthopaedic Surgery
Dr. David P. Charles 5/2007 Associate Professor of Neurology
Dr. Jared Antevil 4/2007 Resident in Thoracic Surgery
Dr. Stephan Russ 2/2007 Resident in the Department of Emergency Medicine
Dr. Joyce Johnson 11/2006 Associate Professor of Pathology
Dr. Bryan Cotton 8/2006 Assistant Professor of Surgery in the Division of Trauma and Critical Care
Dr. Robert Miller 7/2006 Attending physician in Pulmonology/Critical Care
Dr. Christopher Sizemore 4/2006 Intern in Obstetrics and Gynecology
Dr. J. Matthew Hassan 3/2006 Chief Resident in Urologic Surgery
Dr. Anderson Spickard III 2/2006 Assistant Professor of Medicine
Dr. Arthur Fleischer 11/2005 Professor of Radiology and Radiological Sciences
Dr. Robert O. Carpenter 9/2005 General Surgery Resident
Dr. Amber Degryse 8/2005 Internal Medicine Resident
Dr. Bryan Ludwig 7/2005 Neurology Resident
Dr. John Zic 6/2005 Assistant Professor of Dermatology
Dr. Kristina Storck 1/2005 Chief Resident in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
Dr. Ginger E. Holt 11/2004 Assistant Professor in Orthopaedics and Rehabilitation
Dr. William Stone 5/2004 Chief of Nephrology at the V.A. Medical Center, and Professor of Medicine
Dr. Adrian Jarquin-Valdivia 2/2004 Assistant Professor of Neurology
Dr. Eric Sumner 12/2003 Internal Medicine Resident
Dr. Scott M. Rodgers 9/2003 Assistant Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Dr. Jason Martin 8/2003 Internal Medicine Resident
Dr. James L. Netterville 6/2003 Professor of Otolaryngology