UNC Medical Students Tour Beacon Site, Learn from the Southeast Raleigh Community
A group of 30 fourth-year medical students from the University of North Carolina School of Medicine recently visited the Beacon Site campus in Southeast Raleigh as they prepare to begin internships in a range of medical specialties at WakeMed Health & Hospitals.
The tour, led by Southeast Raleigh Promise Operations and Special Initiatives Manager Renada Jackson and Resident Services Coordinator Mikayla Cunningham, gave students an opportunity to learn about the history, culture, and lived experiences of the community they will soon work alongside.
During their time at WakeMed, the students are guided by Dr. Rasheeda Monroe, medical director for WakeMed Physician Practices – Pediatrics, who oversees their educational activities at WakeMed and in the surrounding community. She emphasizes that understanding the realities patients face outside of the clinic is essential to effective care. Helping patients achieve maximum health requires understanding more than what happens behind clinic walls, Monroe says.
The annual tour introduces students to innovative care models and the partnerships that support community health. It provides future physicians an opportunity to learn directly from community leaders and organizations and to better understand the social and environmental factors that influence health and well-being.
During the tour, students learned about the mission of Southeast Raleigh Promise and the organization’s focus on four key pillars that guide its work in the community:
- Mixed-income affordable housing
- Cradle-to-career education
- Economic vitality
- Health and wellness
The tour started at Beacon Point, the 44,000-square-foot hub of the Beacon Site campus that serves as headquarters for Southeast Raleigh Promise and houses a variety of community resources and services, including UNC Health and Advance Community Health specialty clinics. It is also home to offices for Legal Aid of North Carolina and the Family Resource Center, as well as Southeast Raleigh’s first Black-owned café, Cafe Orleans.
The visit also highlighted anchor partners across the Beacon Site campus, including Beacon Ridge Apartments, Self Help, the YMCA of the Triangle and Southeast Raleigh Elementary School. The Southeast Raleigh YMCA’s Associate Executive Director Rodney McCormick and Tisa Miller, the school’s Assistant Principal for grades 3–5, guided the students’ exploration of spaces designed to support community health and connection, including the library and the rooftop and community gardens at Southeast Raleigh Elementary School.
As they begin their journey at WakeMed, the tour reinforces a key lesson: understanding patients in the context of their community helps physicians deliver care that reflects the realities of people’s daily lives.
