Join us at 12:00 PM EDT Thursday, September 3, 10, 17, 24, and October 1, 2026 for the IAMSE Fall 2026 Webcast Audio Seminar Series titled “Mind the Gaps: Essential Conversations for Modern Health Professions Education.”
Further details about the Fall 2026 series, including registration, speakers, topics, and more will be coming soon, so keep an eye on your inbox. For more details on our archives of previous seasons, please visit www.iamse.org.
As the leads of the IM-REACH Mentoring Program, we would like to congratulate those who have completed the program this year.
Mentoring students, postdocs, and faculty and guiding their work is crucial for their success in diverse career paths that encompass leadership, clinical and educational roles. The IM-REACH Mentoring Program is a scholarly professional development program that prepares participants for diverse roles as leaders of mentoring programs, as well as mentors that support mentees in their career paths and academic pursuits. Mentorship is a skill for both the mentor and mentee, a true dynamic relationship that is a journey in pursuit of career engagement and success.
IM-REACH 2026 Mentoring Program Cohort:
Please join us in congratulating the IM-REACH 2026 Mentoring Program Cohort. If you know someone to recommend the IM-REACH Mentoring Program, please visit our website here.
Thank you,
Alice Fornari and Darshana Shah
IM-REACH Mentoring Program Leads
This year, IAMSE showcased over 360 poster and oral presentations, with 13 posters and 10 oral presentations nominated for an award. These awards recognize the most outstanding medical education peer-reviewed presentations at the IAMSE Annual Conference. The first author on the winning poster receives a plaque, one year of IAMSE membership, and access to one series of the IAMSE Audio Seminars.
Outstanding Faculty Oral Presentation
AI vs. Human Analysis in MedEd Qualitative Research: Insights from a Physician Flourishing Program
Presented by: Alice Fornari – Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell (United States)
Click here for the abstract!
Outstanding Student Oral Presentation
A Blended Approach to Teaching Health Policy and Advocacy
Presented by: Farisha Sultan – Medical College of Geogia (United States)
Click here for the abstract!
Outstanding Faculty Poster Presentation
Strengthening Early Interprofessional Education Through Gross Anatomy and Clinical Correlation
Presented by: Lynoshka Caraballo-Mercado – Ponce Health Sciences University (Puerto Rico, United States)
Click here for the abstract!
Outstanding Student Poster Presentation
Beyond Peer Instruction: How Serving as a Near-Peer Teaching Assistant Shapes Knowledge Mastery and Professional Identity
Presented by: Rhiannon Champagne – Texas A&M Naresh K. Vashisht College of Medicine (United States)
Click here for the abstract!
Please join us in congratulating the winners of this year’s awards. If you are interested in submitting an abstract for a poster or oral presentation for the 2027 Annual Conference you may do so at the beginning of October. More information will be shared later this year.
I hope you will join me in congratulating Dr. Yuriy Slyvka, Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine, on being awarded the Medical Science Educator (MSE) 2026 Outstanding Reviewer Award. Dr. Slyvka was awarded with this honor during the International Association of Medical Science Educator’s (IAMSE) Annual Conference earlier this month.
2026 Medical Science Educator Outstanding Reviewer Yuriy Slyvka
This award is an initiative of the Editorial Board of Medical Science Educator, the peer-reviewed journal of IAMSE. The award is presented annually to recognize one of the journal’s reviewers for their outstanding peer review efforts over the past year. The recipients are selected based on several criteria including reviewer performance and delivering the reviews in a timely manner.
Congratulations Dr. Slyvka!
Thank you,
David M. Harris, PhD
Editor-in-Chief, Medical Science Educator
We would like to extend our congratulations to 9 Junior Faculty and 12 students who were awarded the 2026 IAMSE Travel Awards for the upcoming conference. These awards support junior faculty and aspiring educators to attend the IAMSE Annual Conference. Made possible in part by Aquifer and Elsevier, each award is meant to cover the expenses related to attendance at IAMSE Annual Conference, such as conference registration, lodging, and airfare.
The awardees for 2026 are:
Junior Faculty (*Sponsored by Elsevier)
Students (*Sponsored by Aquifer)
Congratulations to this year’s winners! We look forward to seeing you in the future.
IAMSE, on behalf of the Equity and Advocacy Committee (EAC), would like to congratulate Dr. Arkene Levy Johnston for winning the first IAMSE Advocacy and Outreach Award!
Arkene Levy Johnston
The Advocacy and Outreach Award recognizes an IAMSE member for excellence in service work related to Equity and Advocacy in Health Professions Education. Candidates must have demonstrated exemplary advocacy, dedicated evidence or impact related to diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice efforts in health professions education and workforce development, as well as demonstrated a commitment to breaking down barriers for underrepresented persons in health professions education.
Arkene Levy Johnston: Dr. Levy Johnston is Professor of Medical Education and Associate Dean of Community Affairs at Nova Southeastern University Dr. Kiran C. Patel College of Allopathic Medicine (NSU MD). Her work exemplifies this award by transforming pathways into medicine, embedding health equity into curricula, and advancing community-engaged scholarship with measurable outcomes for learners and underserved populations. Dr. Levy Johnston has developed a nationally relevant model for health-professions pathway programming that expands access to first-generation, underrepresented, and medically underserved students. She has been the leader of multiple landmark initiatives, including the Ad-Law-Med Program, a nationally recognized legal-medical pathway featured in Academic Medicine as a model for advocacy-driven interprofessional education; Journey into Medicine, a longitudinal medical-magnet partnership preparing high school students for biomedical careers; and NSU MD’s Summer High School Research Internship Program, which provides paid, mentored research experiences through philanthropic funding she secured as principal investigator. Within undergraduate education, Dr. Levy Johnston has played a key role in advancing health equity through development of culturally responsive curricular initiatives. As Chair of the NSU MD Cultural Competence Task Force, she has led the design of longitudinal, standards-aligned equity curricula for all medical students. Dr. Levy Johnston’s advocacy extends beyond the academy into community health transformation. She is the PI of the Florida Blue Opioid and Substance Abuse Grant and leads a regional coalition delivering culturally tailored, evidence-based prevention curricula to at-risk youth across three counties. In addition, she is Co-PI of the PATHWell Health Equity Initiative, founder of the NSU MD PRIDE Health Fair, and leader of multiple service-learning and wellness initiatives.
Congratulations to Dr. Arkene Levy Johnston. She will be honored at the upcoming 30th Annual IAMSE Conference. We hope you will join us in celebrating her achievements!
Thank you,
Jennifer Hotzman
Chair, IAMSE Equity and Advocacy Committee
IAMSE Communities of Growth (CoGs) are ongoing groups of like-minded individuals who want to informally get together to connect over an area or topic of interest. A Community of Growth is not directly connected to any Committee and is self-organized, and all CoGs are open to all. For more information on IAMSE CoGs, click here.
The AI CoG is the only CoG meeting this month. Below are the details for the meeting.
The AI CoG meeting on Zoom will take place on Wednesday, June 3, 2026,at Noon (12 PM) EDT. IAMSE AI CoG meetings take place regularly at 12 PM ET on the first Wednesday of each month. For information on how to join the AI CoG, email Steve Garwood at garwoods@rowan.edu.
This meeting, the AI CoG will meet for a presentation of the article “A Needs Assessment to Support the Development of a Health Informatics and AI Curriculum for Undergraduate Medical Students,” recently published in Medical Science Educator. The authors/presenters are Janet Lieto, DO, Lin Nelson, MBA, Amany Hassam, PhD, and Nelumdini Samaranayake, PhD.
There will also be announcements/updates from:
The full agenda can be viewed by clicking here.
Please join us for an engaging AI CoG discussion. As a member-based group, your voice is important! See you on June 3rd!
To join the June AI CoG Zoom meeting, click here.
Meeting ID: 966 6621 1082
Passcode: 361577
IAMSE, on behalf of the Professional Development Committee, would like to congratulate Dr. Christopher Burns and Dr. Sol Roberts-Lieb on receiving the Distinguished Career Award and Early Career Award, respectively.
Christopher Burns
The Distinguished Career Award for Excellence in Teaching and Educational Scholarship recognizes an IAMSE member who has a distinguished record of educational scholarship, including educational research and dissemination of scholarly approaches to teaching and education. Candidates must have a significant record of engagement within IAMSE.
Christopher Burns: Dr. Burns is a Professor of Microbiology and Immunology and Director for Active Learning at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. Over a 25-year career, he has built a distinguished record in team-based learning, curriculum development, faculty development, and educational scholarship, including serving as founding faculty at five new colleges of medicine. A committed IAMSE member for 17 years, he has served in multiple leadership roles within the association, including as Founding Chair of both the Website Development Committee and the Student Professional Development Committee.
Sol Roberts-Lieb
The Early Career Award for Excellence in Teaching and Innovation honors an IAMSE member who, early in their career, has made significant innovations in teaching, learning, and assessment. Candidates must have demonstrated less than 10 years of educational scholarship.
Sol Roberts-Lieb: Dr. Roberts-Lieb is an Assistant Professor and Faculty Director of the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. Since joining IAMSE in 2017, he has built a remarkable record of organizational leadership and member engagement, serving as an elected member of the Board of Directors, Secretary of the Executive Board, Inaugural Chair of the Virtual Forum, and Founding Chair of the New Member Onboarding Task Force. His work spans faculty development, curriculum innovation, and educational scholarship, with a focus on building scalable, sustainable systems that support educators across career stages and institutions.
Congratulations to Dr. Burns and Dr. Roberts-Lieb. They will both be honored at the 30th Annual IAMSE Conference in June, and will also be featured at an upcoming IAMSE Cafe. We hope you will join us in celebrating their achievements at the Annual Conference!
IAMSE is pleased to invite you to join us for the 5th Annual IAMSE Virtual Forum. Read on to learn more about this exciting event and keep your calendars open!
Who Should Attend? The Forum is designed for all with an interest in teaching, leading, or developing medicine and health professions sciences curricula. Participants include students, basic scientists, clinicians, and faculty from across various health care and educational disciplines. We highly encourage junior faculty, postdocs, and students to participate in the Forum.
Join us in October for ignite talks, lightning talks, and more!
Stay tuned for more news about the Forum, including this year’s theme, a call for proposals, schedule information, and more!
Thank you,
Amy Stone, PhD
Chair, IAMSE 2026 Virtual Forum Program Committee
The IAMSE 2026 Conference will be here before we know it! This year’s IAMSE Conference, “Flourishing Through Change: Adaptability, Innovation, and Growth in Health Sciences Education,” is June 6-9, 2026, at the Augusta Convention Center & Augusta Marriott in Augusta, Georgia, USA. IAMSE takes great pride in providing opportunities to network with colleagues from around the world at our annual conferences. Below, we would like to highlight these networking events that will be taking place at the conference!
Saturday, June 6, 2026
Sunday, June 7, 2026
Monday, June 8, 2026
For more information about speakers, events, and registration, please visit www.iamseconference.org. If you have any questions, please reach out to support@iamse.org.
We hope to see you in Augusta!
This year, one of the Professional Development Workshops (PDWS), Integrating Basic Science and Clinical Medicine, will be sponsored by Aquifer.
Workshop: Integrating Basic Science and Clinical Medicine: From Curriculum to Classroom to Learner Assessment (2 Parts)
When: Part 1 – Saturday, June 6, 2026, 8:00 AM – 11:00 AM EDT; Part 2 – Saturday, June 6, 2026, 12:30 PM – 3:30 PM EDT
Presented by: Eva Gallman, David Harris, Julie Kerry, Kathryn Miller, Kristel Montano, Khiet Ngo, Grace Park, and Leah Sheridan
This 6-hour, faculty development course will begin with an interactive group discussion to identify key barriers to designing and implementing curricula that promote effective cognitive integration and transfer in the classroom. This course will immerse participants in the Aquifer Sciences Curriculum, a freely available curriculum collaboratively created by IAMSE and Aquifer and integrating basic science and clinical medicine. Following a brief didactic on concept-based learning and knowledge organization, cognitive integration, and collaborative teaching, participants will be formally introduced to the Aquifer Sciences Curriculum Database and will explore its organizational structure and the pedagogical approach of the Integrated Learning Objective (ILO) to support cognitive integration. The core concepts that make up the backbone of this Curriculum define the endpoint of necessary basic science understanding to permit a clinical trainee to justify safe and effective clinical decisions. Participants will work in small groups to consider how the core concepts of the Curriculum can facilitate backwards curriculum design and will modify existing classroom experiences to take advantage of the approach to cognitive integration promoted by the Integrated Learning Objective approach.
Participants will then consider the use of Integrated Illness Scripts and Mechanism of Disease maps to develop classroom activities that promote cognitive integration. Participants will actively engage in an Integrated Learning Sessions (ILS) for a pre-clerkship course and will outline their own session using a template designed to compare and contrast the underlying concepts and mechanisms that underpin a variety of clinical features in related and disparate clinical conditions to inform safe clinical decision-making. Participants will then practice using these tools in the design of learning activities and assessments within their own curricular frameworks and across various educational settings (e.g., longitudinal clerkships, clerkship didactics, bedside teaching, active classrooms, faculty development). Concrete examples of the use of the tools and assessments across several schools and various educational settings will be provided. Finally, the value of the considered pedagogical and assessment approaches to foster development of the Master Adaptive Learner will be evaluated.
Learning Outcomes
Upon completion of this workshop, attendees will be able to
Each workshop requires an additional $140 USD registration fee. Already registered? You can still add PDWS to your schedule by modifying your registration. To do so, you may click here.
If you have any questions or would like assistance adding a workshop to your schedule, please contact support@iamse.org.
Our Association is a robust and diverse set of educators, students, researchers, medical professionals, volunteers and academics that come from all walks of life and from around the globe. Each month we choose a member to highlight their academic and professional career and see how they are making the best of their membership in IAMSE. This month’s Featured Member is IAMSE 2026 Conference Program Chair Will Brooks.
Will Brooks, PhD
Professor
Department of Medical Education
University of Alabama at Birmingham
Birmingham, Alabama, USA
How long have you been a member of IAMSE?
I joined the Association in 2013 after starting as faculty at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. I was encouraged to join IAMSE by a colleague at UAB and have loved every minute of it!
Looking at your time with the Association, what have you most enjoyed doing? What are you most looking forward to?
There are so many things that I have enjoyed doing with IAMSE. The annual conference each year is a highlight for me. I love interacting with colleagues from around the world, hearing wonderful talks, and learning about new approaches to teaching and learning in medical education that I can take back with me. Working with the Webcast Audio Seminar Series (WAS) committee has been another highlight of my time with IAMSE. I learned so much from the incredible people who made up the WAS and established lasting friendships. And, of course, chairing the 2026 Annual Conference has been an incredible experience of continued growth and learning. Right now, I am most looking forward to attending the 2026 Conference. I can’t wait to see the fruits of the Program Committee’s collective efforts, and I know that I will bring home so many new ideas to try out and collaborations to engage in for the upcoming academic year.
What interesting things are you working on outside of the Association right now?
My colleagues and I at UAB have been working on an evaluation of long-term outcomes from our Rural Medicine Track. It has been very rewarding to see the outcomes of a program that is 30 years old. We are also looking at how we can use both curricular and para-curricular formative assessments to build a predictive model that will allow early identification of students at risk of failing preclinical coursework so that early intervention can be used to support success.
As the Chair of this year’s IAMSE Program Committee, what do you most enjoy about being in this role?
The people! Working with such a talented group of people on the committee and with the IAMSE administrative staff has been awesome. Getting to know our plenary speakers and learning about their work has been equally rewarding.
What can people expect from this year’s conference?
The 2026 Annual Conference in Augusta, GA promises great Southern hospitality, charm, and cuisine. As a native Alabamian who grew up in a rural setting, I am very proud of my Southern heritage and look forward to sharing a bit of my Southern culture with the IAMSE membership. The four plenary speakers that are lined up will bring a wealth of wisdom and excitement to the conference that you don’t want to miss. Folks should also expect an incredible array of research talks, posters, and focus sessions that are sure to re-ignite your passion for health professions education!
Anything else you would like to add?
This year’s conference will host a local bookstore from Augusta to sell a collection of high impact books in medical education, some of which were even authored by our plenary speakers. Be sure to check out the collection and do some shopping for your office library!