History of the Faculty Development Program

In 1992, Morehouse School of Medicine’s Family Medicine Department was experiencing challenges recruiting and retaining minority faculty. At the same time, the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) reported that there were only 52 African-American full-time academic family physicians in the nation, one-third of whom were on faculty at historically-black institutions. 

In response to both our own challenge and the broader implications of the lack of minority faculty, we began offering a one-year faculty development program for faculty from all clinical disciplines within MSM, as well as community-based preceptors, senior residents and other health care professionals. Training modules included teaching and writing skills, curriculum development, grant writing, clinical research and career development and leadership skills.

In 2003, we reached out to a national audience through our Executive Faculty Development Program. Primary care faculty and preceptors from across the nation come to our facility four times a week for one week to receive training in a compressed version of the 36-week longitudinal program. One participant from California said, “as a woman of color, this was the first positive experience I have had in an academic setting”. She later received word that the grant she wrote for a community intervention project was fully funded.