Mike McCormack G’25, Devron Felder G’25 and Samir Halalou G’25 call themselves the ‘Room Dogs,’ after an impromptu nickname created a laugh for the three. But now, as the Physician Assistant Studies students prepare to graduate, their bond has become more than a nickname.
Mike McCormack G’25, Devron Felder G’25 and Samir Halalou G’25 come from very different backgrounds. McCormack is a former hospital lab technician from Massachusetts, Felder served in the U.S. Navy as a hospital corpsman and Halalou was an aspiring soccer player born in Ghana. But Elon University brought them together.
“We really complemented each other,” said McCormack. “I’m thankful for Samir and Dev for pushing me out of my shell and having me go out more. It was a fun experience, and I wouldn’t change a thing. It’s friends we’ll have for life.”
The ‘Room Dogs’
The three men are not only classmates in the Physician Assistant Studies program, but also roommates. Before coming to Elon, McCormack posted on a Facebook page for the PA studies cohort and connected with Felder and Halalou. They quickly formed a bond.
“We flew down here in October 2023 to meet each other and look at apartments,” said Halalou. “Mike came to pick me up from my hotel, and when I got in the car, the first thing I realized was he was playing Fella Cuti, who is a very popular Nigerian artist, and that’s how we kicked it off. I’m like, ‘Oh, we got the same vibe and taste in music.’”
The connection was aided by a nickname given to them by the store associate at a mattress store where McCormack and Halalou were shopping.
“I was like ‘This is my roommate and I’m bringing him out so he can get a mattress,’ and he said ‘Oh, you guys are room dogs!’” said McCormack with a laugh. “I don’t know where he came up with that, but it just stuck, and we named our group chat based on that.”
But their friendship proved to be more than just a nickname; their varied skills helped guide each other through the two-year program. Felder’s experience as an enlisted hospital corpsman and then an independent hospital corpsman gave him real-world experience managing different conditions and patients. McCormack earned his undergraduate degree in medical laboratory science and had experience interpreting lab results. Halalou was initially exposed to X-rays after tearing his labrum at 15 years old, leading him to eventually become an X-ray technician.
“Our differences made each other better,” said Felder. “I’m the super definition of a non-traditional student, so how to study and how to be in school again was something I had no idea about. Mike and Samir showed me how to be a person in school again since it’d been a couple of years.”
A team approach
The three students are preparing to graduate on Dec. 12 during Elon’s School of Health Sciences commencement ceremony. It’s a culmination of the 24-month Physician Assistant Studies program, which engages students through an innovative systems-organized curriculum that employs large and small group discussion, hands-on clinical skills labs, simulated patient experiences, lecture and patient scenario discussions. Upon graduation, students are prepared to pass the Physician Assistant National Certifying Examination (PANCE).
“I liked the team approach to medicine,” said Felder, of his choice in PA studies. “It’s one team, one fight. That’s always appealed to me.”
For all three students, the faculty in the program made a difference as well.
“I really liked how accessible the faculty is,” McCormack said. “They’re available to you. They seem generally invested in student success. I like how we’re focused on the communities we serve, like with the Open Door Clinic. They are very mission-focused.”
“We really complemented each other. I’m thankful for Samir and Dev for pushing me out of my shell and having me go out more. It was a fun experience, and I wouldn’t change a thing. It’s friends we’ll have for life.”
-Mike McCormack G’25
Shared success
Halalou says the support from the program helped him when he initially felt out of place because of his background.
“You see all your friends and classmates and ask yourself, ‘Do you even deserve to be here?’ I would say yes, I deserve to be here. And Elon has exceeded my expectations,” said Halalou. “It’s like a family.”
The program’s class sizes, ability to learn through the Anatomical Gift Program and ultrasound training were all big benefits. Felder and McCormack want to enter emergency medicine, while Halalou is exploring critical care – two areas of medicine that can continue to bond them together.
“There are some problems and conditions where we can fix it, and then the patient can leave,” said McCormack of emergency medicine. “But for those very complex patients, or they have a lot going on, we’d admit them and send them to Samir, and Samir would solve the problem, and then they can go home.”
And Felder says it’s that collaborative spirit that drew him to Elon in the first place
“We’re all in this together,” he said. “I went to some other program where they were very competitive amongst themselves, but at Elon, it felt more like our successes were shared successes. We struggled together, and we succeeded together.”