The Weill Cornell Medicine Department of Psychiatry offers the Benjamin Rush Scholarship to a highly qualified and motivated incoming psychiatry resident who foresees a career in scholarship or mental health policy.
In addition to required clinical training, the Benjamin Rush Scholar completes a parallel track of study conferring expertise in the history of psychiatry, neuroscience and the behavioral sciences. The Benjamin Rush Scholar commences these studies at the beginning of the PGY-II year, with "Oxford" style tutorials and readings. Topics covered include the history of psychiatric diagnosis and treatment, psychiatric professionalization and institutionalization, psychiatry and the law, ethics, the emergence of psychoanalysis and neuroscience, and psychiatry in culture and society. Readings of critical primary and secondary sources will be supplemented by discussions with selected nationally renowned mentors, as well as participation in the working groups of the Department's DeWitt Wallace Institute of Psychiatry: History, Policy and the Arts.
Midway through PGY-III year of residency, the Benjamin Rush Scholar chooses their her own course of independent study in a branch of history or mental health policy and is assigned a mentor to facilitate and guide their research. The expectation is that the Benjamin Rush Scholar will complete a publishable paper in this selected area by the end of residency. The Benjamin Rush Scholarship includes an annual expense account for books, travel and research activities.
Scholarship Directors
George J. Makari, M.D.
Professor of Psychiatry
Director of DeWitt Wallace Institute of Psychiatry
