WORKSHOP SESSION TITLE:  Strategies to Increase Motivation for Teaching
   
SESSION LEADER(S):  Dr. Ruth-Marie Fincher, Medical College of Georgia School of Medicine, Altanta, Georgia, USA
 
OTHER PRESENTERS:  Gary Rosenfeld, PhD, University of Texas Medical School at Houston, Houston, Texas, USA
Charles Seidel, PhD, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA
Robert Watson, MD, University of Florida College of Medicine, Gainesville, Floridia, USA
   
HANDOUTS  or  SLIDES
  
What issues were raised in this session?

Background
Teaching was once, but is no longer, the major focus of most medical schools. Nearly all medical school mission statements, and most promotion and tenure guidelines, include teaching as an expectation. Yet, funded research and clinical care/income are often the key factors in promotion or salary determination.

Strategies to increase motivation for teaching

Robert Watson
  • Provide an education center to help faculty, including:
    Staff and supplies
    Course and clerkship budgets (allocation of funds)
    Information technology
    Teaching and educational research/scholarship skills development
  • Recognize and reward teaching effort and quality through:
    Awards
    Promotion and tenure
    Reimbursement
Charles Seidel
  • Role of Academies of Education   
    Academies as change agents
        Source of funding (salaries, research grants)
        “Community” of support
        Source of documentation of faculty accomplishments
    Elements of academies
        School-wide, non-departmental organization
        Mission to support all aspects of the school’s educational activities
        Membership through a peer-review process
        Available resources to support mission of academy
    Examples discussed
Most detail: Baylor’s Academy of Distinguished Educators (and Fulbright and Jaworski Award)
Less detail:
Academies at Harvard and University of California, San Francisco
Society of Medical Educators, Medical College of Wisconsin
Gary Rosenfeld
  • Faculty development and support for teaching and education: Application of a model for change (Bolman & Deal: Reframing Organizations)
 Structural, Human Resources, Administrative (Political in original model), and Symbolic domains were discussed. Current and envisioned future applications in each area were discussed.

Which of these was the main focus of discussion?

  • Strategies to reward teaching: Successes and frustrations from various schools
  • Measuring teaching contributions, creating a database, and using the data to allocate funds and reward teaching
  • Strategies for developing a variation on the “academy” theme in a shoestring budget
What was the major outcome or group consensus on these issues?

  • “Culture” change, led or strongly supported by the dean, is essential to heighten the value of teaching
  • Most faculty are motivated to teach when quality teaching is valued by the institution (however, some are superb teachers without reward)
  • Quantifying teaching contributions is difficult, but can be done; assessing and rewarding quality of teaching is more difficult
  • Promotion and tenure systems that value teaching and scholarship related to teaching are a strong stimulus for faculty to teach


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