Medical Education’s Commitment to Staff Development: How we collectively learn, grow and thrive
The Office of Medical Education attracts the smartest and most innovative people to join our staff. These talented individuals—each bringing unique expertise and insight to our collective work—support and advance our work, helping build one of the most innovative and effective medical education programs worldwide.
With a highly skilled and motivated team comes a commitment from us to help each person do their best work every day and to further grow their knowledge and skills—all to help them prepare for the next stage of their career.
“Innovative, high-quality education comes from a world-class team of staff working in partnership with their faculty colleagues. Our staff are passionate about continual learning and consistently improving the initiatives and programs that support our learners,” says Kevin H. Souza, MS, Associate Dean for Medical Education. “We are committed to supporting staff members to engage as experts in the education mission and to grow and thrive in the learning environment.”
We encourage our staff to pursue educational scholarship alongside our faculty, to present their work at medical education meetings, identify and advance their career goals through competency based development plans, and pursue opportunities that maximize the alignment between their personal and professional aspirations.
Under the leadership of Allison Savage, Manager, Special Projects and Staff Engagement, the Office of Medical Education hosts a learning and development program that draws on the talent of our medical education staff and local experts to develop and lead peer-learning opportunities.
Over the past year, we offered workshops on Unconscious Bias and Medical Education 101, noon-time webinars on our financial model and our communication strategy, and hands-on activities such as a tour of the Kanbar Center for Simulation and a field trip to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
Highlights from this year’s learning and development program included a variety of activities designed to advance the knowledge and skills of our staff, while also building a team that pushes the limits of our mission to educate the 21st Century Physician:
• Collectively we internalized the UCSF PRIDE values and made them our own by defining the behaviors that represent each value when viewed through the lens of education
• We prepared to support the School’s accreditation under the Liaison Committee of Medical Education (LCME)
• Staff members attended webinars hosted by their peers on topics including the School of Medicine Strategic Plan, the effective use of social media channels, writing clear emails, and how to use technologies such as Smart Sheet
• We volunteered in our community by supporting Bay Area organizations such as Project Open Hand
• Medical education staff attended scholarly conferences such as the Western Group on Educational Affairs (WGEA), the Association of American Medical Colleges’ (AAMC) Learn, Serve, Lead meeting in Boston, and the Group on Information Resources meeting in Austin, Texas
• Members of our team are pursing masters and PhD programs while continuing to work, and this year two of our staff (Raquel Rodriguez and Christina Cicoletti) are completing the AAMC’s yearlong Leadership Education and Development (LEAD) Certificate Program—they were the only medical education staff nationally who were selected for this year’s program
• Forty of our staff were nominated by their peers to receive UCSF SPOT or Achievement Awards, which recognize significant contributions for a specific project or task, and sustained, exceptional performance, respectively
“Pushing the boundaries of excellence when educating the 21st Century Physician, who will continuously contribute to the health and well-being of our communities throughout their career, is hard work. Few medical schools are able to achieve the level of excellence we demonstrate on a daily basis; excellence that has built, supports, and continuously improves the Bridges Curriculum; one of the most successful collections of residency and fellowship training programs in the country; and renowned continuing education programs for our practicing physicians,” says Kevin.
Our engagement with and enthusiasm for our work in medical education is translating into the continual improvement of our programs, the creation of innovative ways to solve problems, and the strengthening of partnerships with our faculty and our learners.