Professionalism: orientation exercises for incoming osteopathic medical students and developing class vision statements.

The Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine has developed an exercise to introduce professional ethics and behavior at the earliest stages of medical education. During orientation, each incoming class creates a class vision statement. After small group discussions on professional ethics, honesty, and responsibilities, representatives from each group collated student input and constructed a class vision statement reflective of student consensus on these issues.