Roland “Red” Hiss Lecture and MESP Research Symposium

911 North University Avenue,Ann Arbor MI 48104

06 June, 2023

Description

Please join the Department of Learning Health Sciences on June 6, 2023 for the annual Hiss Lecture, an event honoring former department chair Dr. Roland "Red" Hiss and celebrating medical education at the University of Michigan. This event includes the invited Hiss Lecture and a poster show celebrating the accomplishments of this year's cohort of the Medical Education Scholars Program, the Department of Learning Health Sciences' longitudinal faculty development program in educational research. We are excited that Laura Hirshfield, PhD will give this year's Hiss Lecture, titled "Improving Academic Medicine Pathways for Underrepresented Physicians: The case for a shift in focus from individuals to the profession." Talk Description Calls for diversifying the healthcare workforce have become increasingly common, with arguments made about the value of identity-concordant healthcare providers, as well as the benefits of diverse perspectives in the workforce. Scholars within academic medicine primarily focus on individual-level solutions to address underrepresentation, by developing pipeline programs or providing insights into the ways that members of underrepresented groups need support in their professional development to better fit into academic medicine. In this talk, I will review these arguments and make the case for a shift in focus - rather than expect underrepresented candidates to adapt themselves to fit with academic medicine, I argue that academic medicine should shift its culture and structure to better align with the needs of members of underrepresented groups. Dr. Laura Hirshfield is the inaugural Dr. Georges Bordage Medical Education Faculty Scholar and an Associate Professor of Medical Education and Sociology at the University of Illinois College of Medicine. She is also a faculty affiliate in the Department of Sociology at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She received her Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Michigan and her B.A. from Swarthmore College, where she studied Sociology/Anthropology and Education. She is the Director of the Doctoral Program in Health Professions Education and the associate program director for the Masters in Health Professions Education program. In these roles, Laura mentors a variety of trainees, including undergraduates, medical students, residents, postdoctoral associates, faculty, and graduate students (both in Health Professions Education and in Sociology). A sociologist and ethnographer by training, Laura is broadly interested in social interaction, identity, education, science, work/organizations, and medicine. Her research investigates the impact of identity (especially gender, race, and gender identity) on the ways that individuals interact within academic and medical contexts, as well as the long-term impact of these differences on interaction style. Since becoming a medical educator, Laura has also worked to highlight and strengthen the linkages between the fields of sociology and health professions education. Her work in this area includes several review articles on the topic and an upcoming special issue in Social Science & Medicine Qualitative Research in Health with the Executive Board Members of the Sociology of Health Professions Education Collaborative (soc-hpe.com), a group she co-founded. Laura’s research has been funded by the Arnold P. Gold Foundation, the NBME’s Stemmler Fund, AAMC, and UIC's Chicago Area Study and has been published in Medical Education, Social Science & Medicine, and JAMA Surgery, among other venues. She is also an Assistant Editor for Academic Medicine.