The Medical College Campus on the southern outskirts of Vellore city is a 200-acre wooded site at the foot of College Hill. Built in 1932, it remains, as originally envisaged, a residential community where students and staff can study and reside in serene and beautiful surroundings.
The central college chapel opens on to a sunken garden and connects with the Women’s Hostel and various classrooms through peaceful stone corridors. Interspersed among the tall trees and winding roads are other hostels, administrative, teaching and research facilities, staff residences, guest houses, playing fields and more.
With birdsong in the morning, the buzz of classes through the day, the sound of music and games, vespers on a Sunday evening and the silence of the night stars – the College Campus has been a cherished home to generations of students and faculty for over 80 years.
The majority of students live in the hostels (MBBS and BSc Nursing programmes are fully residential; others allow day scholars). The Bagayam campus has the Women’s and Men’s Hostels for MBBS students, the Fitch Hostel for Allied Health, the Dorothy Joske Hostel for Allied Health men students and the Modale International Hostel for elective / visitor-observer students from overseas.
The founder, Dr. Ida Scudder, shared a large part of her life with her students, and this was one of the key factors in ensuring both their academic success, their spiritual growth and commitment to service. This gurukul type of education is followed even today, to the extent possible. A foster parenting system has been developed whereby every student is welcomed by one of the staff families as an adopted member. These relationships often outlive the student days.
The number of students at CMC Vellore is relatively small in comparison with other medical educational institutions. Here, student life is not all academics. Students are encouraged to manage all aspects of their respective hostels, under the guidance of a resident warden and a senior warden. This includes managing budgets for the mess and various activities and projects as well as organising events such as the annual hostel day entertainment and various competitions within each hostel.
They develop a variety of social, cultural and religious activities, and the history and traditions of the institution add to the richness of the experience. Students participate in the Sunday evening worship services in the college and hospital chapels, in class prayers and Bible studies.
Different batches of students are taken to outstation locations for weekend retreats by the Chaplaincy Department. Students put up plays, musicals and special events periodically, with the help of staff members. The staff also take the stage occasionally with a highly entertaining Staff Entertainment.
There are facilities for various games and athletics on the campuses, in addition to a gymnasium on College Campus. Apart from the medical libraries, the Chaplaincy Department maintains libraries on campus and anyone can borrow religious and general books and magazines.
