Part-Time Director of Transitions Curriculum

The Director, Transitions Curriculum provides unified leadership for the transition courses spanning the MD program and the graduation competency OSCE, and serves as a Clinical Coach, providing individualized coaching and remediation to medical students. The position holds sole course direction for the TRAN sequence and co-direction, with partner offices, of the courses that bracket it at entry and at re- entry, so that one faculty member is accountable for coherence across every transition point. The position is housed in the Office of Educational Affairs and reports to the assistant dean for Clinical Applications. The clinical coaching portion of effort is functionally directed by the Director of Academic Success in the Office of Student Affairs, consistent with the Clinical Coach position description. The Director works closely with the assistant dean for Foundations of Medicine, the associate dean for Undergraduate Medical Education, clerkship directors, clinical skills faculty, and colleagues in academic and student affairs.

Transition experiences mark the major inflection points of medical school: entry into medical school, entry into the clinical environment, advancement to the fourth year, and final preparation for residency. These courses are currently directed separately, which limits developmental sequencing across the arc of the curriculum and distributes programmatic evaluation across multiple owners. This position consolidates that leadership, through direct course direction where the courses sit in Educational Affairs and through co-direction where they are shared with Student Affairs, so the transition courses function as a coherent, vertically integrated sequence in which each course activates prior learning and prepares students for the next phase of training.

The clinical coaching portion of the role fits the transitions portfolio closely rather than incidentally. Clinical performance gaps surface at the same moments the transition courses serve; the graduation competency OSCE sits within this position's oversight, and coaching remediation for that OSCE is a Clinical Coach duty. The Clinical Coach position also carries MEDU 9510 Transition to Clinical Medicine, a refresher course for learners returning from a leave of absence, which is a different kind of transition: individual re-entry into the clinical environment rather than cohort advancement through it. Combining cohort-level transitions with individual-level re-entry and remediation work in one position gives a single faculty member a longitudinal view of student development that a single-phase role does not provide.

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DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Direct or co-direct all transition courses across the MD curriculum, maintaining syllabi, learning objectives, session materials, and assessment plans in alignment with program objectives and LCME expectations.
• Coordinate scheduling, faculty staffing, simulation center use, and standardized patient capacity across the concentrated transition course weeks, recognizing that TRAN7900 and TRAN9100 run in back-to-back weeks and draw on shared resources.
• Administer the graduation competency OSCE, including blueprinting to AAMC EPAs, rater training, standard setting, score reporting to the appropriate committee, and coordination of remediation.
• Provide operational management for design, implementation, data collection, and distillation of programmatic evaluation for the transitions portfolio.
• Provide individualized one-on-one clinical coaching, co-direct MEDU 9510 Transition to Clinical Medicine with the other Clinical Coaches, participate in monthly At Risk meetings and phase- based cohort reviews, offer open OSCE practice sessions, and remediate graduation competency OSCE failures as needed.
• Collaborate with faculty, staff, and students to create a supportive and efficient educational environment.
• Provide support and tracking for LCME elements relevant to transitions and assessment, and others as identified on an annual basis by the UME Strategy Leadership team.
• Contribute to the ongoing enhancement of the medical education curriculum by participating in quality assurance activities, identifying areas for improvement, and suggesting innovative solutions.
• Analyze evaluation data to identify trends, strengths, and areas for improvement within the curriculum and educational methodologies.
• Stay updated on best practices in transitions education, assessment, and coaching, and engage the national community of practice, including the Transition to Residency course director network and listserv, the NRMP Transition to Residency conference, AAMC transition resources, and AMA ChangeMedEd work on transitions across the continuum. Faculty development resources support this engagement.
• Attend workshops, conferences, and professional development opportunities to continually enhance skills.
• Availability to work on weekends and evenings to complete time-sensitive projects.
• Acquire knowledge of new technology and policy/procedure revisions.
• All other duties as assigned.

QUALIFICATIONS:

• MD, DO, or equivalent.
• Eligible for faculty appointment at WMed.
• Minimum of 3 years' experience in medical education or a comparable setting.
• Experience as a course or clerkship director, or comparable educational leadership experience, preferred.
• Experience in academic coaching or remediation preferred.

About Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine (WMed)

We are committed to excellence and health equity through transformative medical education, high-quality, patient- and family-centered care, innovative research, and community partnerships within a welcoming, supportive, and engaging culture. Our vision is health equity for all in Southwest Michigan through innovation in the practice and study of medicine.

The medical school is a collaboration of Western Michigan University and Kalamazoo's two teaching health systems, Beacon and Bronson Healthcare. The medical school is a private nonprofit corporation supported by private gifts, clinical revenues, research activities, tuition, and endowment income. WMed is the recipient of a $100 million foundational gift and the Empowering Futures Gift, a philanthropic commitment of $300 million to support the mission of the medical school. WMed contributes to the economic vitality of Southwest Michigan through the services we provide, as well as the creation of 1,600 new jobs, with an estimated annual economic impact of $353 million in Kalamazoo and Calhoun counties.

WMed is fully accredited by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education and the Higher Learning Commission. The medical school offers a comprehensive, innovative four-year Doctor of Medicine degree program as well as a Master of Science degree program in Biomedical Sciences. We train physicians in 10 residencies and four fellowships accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education. To support our educational mission, we have Joint Accreditation for interprofessional continuing education, which incorporates accreditation by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education.

WMed Health is the clinical practice of the medical school with more than 300 providers offering comprehensive primary care and specialty services in several locations throughout the Kalamazoo and Battle Creek areas. Faculty in the Department of Pathology serve as the Office of the Medical Examiner for counties throughout Michigan and northern Indiana.

The W.E. Upjohn M.D. Campus located in downtown Kalamazoo serves as the primary educational facility with student study and social spaces, team-based learning halls, faculty and administrative offices, a state-of-the-art Simulation Center accredited by the Society for Simulation in Healthcare, basic science research labs, as well as toxicology and forensic pathology labs.

WMed builds upon Kalamazoo's century-long foundation of drug discovery and medical device development with a strategic investment in clinical, laboratory, community, and educational research. The Center for Immunobiology, Center for Clinical Research, Research Histology Lab, Innovation Center, and Human Research Protection Program contribute to the medical school's advancement of knowledge through innovation and discovery.

Equal Employment Opportunity Employer in compliance with applicable State and Federal law.