When the School of Medicine Class of 2011 arrived on campus for the first time, they were greeted with presentations, paperwork … and a big box of real, human bones.

A tradition during Medical School orientation, the first-year students lined up in Kresge Hall on Aug. 8 to receive their assigned box containing a half skeleton and skull.

Students receive their boxes in preparation for their first block of the Year 1 medical curriculum, "Anatomical Structure,” where they will study the human body at the macroscopic level.

Students will be responsible for gathering information about the body on their own, through laboratory dissections, handouts, textbooks, atlases, self-instruction, diagnostic imaging displays and videotapes.

At clinical problem-solving conferences, students will demonstrate knowledge of the body region they studied and must think through the clinical applications of the information.

However, students are not flying completely solo; faculty members question students and provide feedback.