Determinants of Female and Minority Medical Faculty

This project was designed to assess faculty development at five medical schools — Duke, George Washington, Tufts, the University of Minnesota and the University of New Mexico — with special attention to women and minority faculty, and to identify ways to improve their careers by altering existing cultures. Already the five schools are part of a Learning Action Network structured to identify variables that can have a positive or negative impact on career development, so that those schools can address the variables in their faculty development programs.

The deans and other top officials and faculty members of the five medical schools are involved in the project, which is being overseen by a national advisory board.

Late in 2005, the Macy Board approved two years of support for the project, with the expectation that the federal Agency for Health Research Quality would provide the additional funding needed to complete the study. When that funding failed to materialize, the Macy Board approved additional funding to complete the project.

Work in this final phase includes completion of faculty interviews in the five schools, a national faculty quantitative survey to be conducted in cooperation with the Association of American Medical Colleges, support for the Learning Action Network and advisory group activities, and evaluation and dissemination of the study findings.