How best to evaluate clinician-educators and teachers for promotion?

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Academic Promotion

Background:

• Evaluating educational scholars and clinician-educators for academic promotion presents unique challenges.
• Traditional promotion criteria may not fully capture the impact of teaching and educational scholarship.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose a framework for evaluating educational scholars and teachers based on the impact of their work.
• To introduce the "impact map" as a tool for visualizing and assessing educator impact.

Main Methods:

• Differentiating evaluation criteria for educational scholars (objective impact) and teachers (subjective learner influence).
• Utilizing learner feedback on profound influence alongside traditional teaching metrics.
• Developing and presenting the "impact map" for graphical portrayal of clinician-educator track records.

Main Results:

• Educational scholars' impact can be assessed through objective changes in methods, careers, practices, and health outcomes.
• Teacher impact evaluation should incorporate learners' perspectives on deep influence.
• The "impact map" offers a vivid, organized method for displaying evidence of impact over time.

Conclusions:

• A shift towards outcome-oriented assessment is crucial for fair and rigorous promotion of educators and clinician-educators.
• The proposed principles and the "impact map" tool can enhance the promotion process.
• Emphasizing evidence of impact ensures greater fairness and rigor in evaluating educational contributions.