Officials praise the method because it allows students watch a problem unfold from Monday to Friday and take information from several different clinical areas at once.

"Students do a lot of foraging on their own," Federman says.

"The real innovation of the New Pathway is that the biological sciences are taught in a tutorial fashion rather than a lecture fashion," says Byron J. Good, professor of medical anthropology at HMS.

Happy Students, Happy Doctors

According to Good, who interviewed students from both the traditional and the New Pathway over a four-year period, students using problem based learning have generally had more positive medical school experiences.

"It was obvious that [the experiences] were different," Good says. “People found the New Pathway more fun."

By allowing students to spend time looking up their articles for themselves instead of reading textbooks, professors say the curriculum keeps students active.

"They are thinking and talking every-day instead of sitting there listening," Federman says.

"[The students] felt that they learned the material in a way that was close to clinical cases," Good says. "It's more practical."

Federman also said he believes Harvard students enjoy learning through the New Pathway.

"Our students are much happier in medical school now than they were with our previous method," Federman says. "I don't feel it; I know it."

Introduced in the New Pathway program was also a class called the Patient/Doctor course, which introduces issues such as ethics, culture, race, gender and economics and shows students how they relate to medicine.

"It involves a deep respect for the moral and professional responsibilities of being a doctor," Federman says. "The patient/doctor course and problem-based learning are focused on sick persons."

By combining realistic case studies and moral education, Good says the New Pathway helps students understand a disease's effect on patients' worlds, not just their bodies.

"The patient's illness rather than just the disease becomes important," Good says.