At the 2018 Program for Educators, faculty member Victoria Brazil led a professional development session for course faculty intended to prompt reflection on our career trajectories. Victoria asked a series of six questions to our faculty members, and we thought our Harvard Macy blog readers would enjoy hearing Victoria’s answers to the same questions.

What levels of supervision are required for physician trainees? This month’s #MedEdPearl focuses on faculty supervision levels using a prospective, summative entrustment scale that fosters physician trainee progression toward autonomy.  As trusting propensity is an important component in supervision and entrustment, ten Cate and colleagues have developed an easily understood model for communicating aspects of entrustment through level of supervision for trainee assessment. The model describes elements of progression and decision-making that can foster autonomy in the learner.  As a complement to ten Cate's model, the #MedEdPearls team offers the following questions to quickly assess the required level of supervision for a learner while encouraging learner growth.

The technology landscape has changed a great deal even since my first Harvard Macy blog post back in 2015. As computing power increases exponentially, we are seeing many of the technologies that were previously thought to be science fiction coming to fruition. Artificial intelligence, machine learning, neural networks, blockchain technology, augmented reality, virtual reality, and 3D printing are now making their way into common language outside of our higher education walls. Ever increasing attention has been given to technologies like augmented (AR) and virtual reality (VR), with new companies popping up every day and existing companies scrambling to expand their capabilities utilizing these technologies. In 2017 alone, venture capitalists poured over $3 billion dollars investing in AR and VR startups and the global healthcare AR/VR market is expected to hit $15 billion by 2026. Virtual and augmented reality headsets are free falling in price and rapidly hitting the consumer market with the HTC Vive and Facebook’s Oculus Rift falling from $800 in 2017 to $399-499 in 2018. Mobile based AR is rapidly gaining popularity as our everyday devices are now being supported by Apple’s ARkit and Google’s ARCore. Bringing these technologies to mobile devices will have huge implications in education and learning.

This post is not intended to be exhaustive, but rather a snapshot and examples of what technological capabilities are out there. Regardless of the technology, the adage ‘Content is King’ strongly resonates. One must remember that the technology will never make up for poor content or pedagogy. Although there is strong buzz around these technologies, I encourage everyone to be critical and see how the technology can actually add value or capabilities to the educational content without being the educational content itself. The best way to evaluate this is to ask yourself, ‘Could this content be made meaningful without this technology?’ For example, a virtual patient in VR may be cool, but are the interactions with the patient the same that could be had with much lower technology like a laptop or mobile device? In some instances, technology can actually add unnecessary cognitive load and detract from the learning experience.

This blog will detail technological advancements in the consumer and educational realm, and how medical educators are starting to use this technology to augment and, in some instances, replace existing learning experiences.

For those of us in the United States, it was a special holiday version of #HMIchat on July 4^th— a 24 hour asynchronous chat (no synchronous sessions this time)! Because July 1^st marks the beginning of a new academic year here in the US, the focus was medical education goals for the 2018-2019 academic year. Personal, professional, and institutional medical education goals were all welcomed.

Despite the holiday, our @HarvardMacy community showed up to share & help! We shared goals such as: create a curriculum that is both sustainable and malleable, complete graduate training, learn about various education strategies, increase habits of self-care, and develop new research interests. Many of us struggle with how to move forward with a new goal. Fortunately, our community members shared several wonderful resources—here are just a few:

Great book for curriculum building, shared by Lonika Sood.

Great book for presenting the evidence in medical education, shared by Teresa Sörö.

How to write great multiple choice questions, shared by Teresa Sörö.

Practice doesn’t make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect.

• Vince Lombardi

Teaching procedural skills to novice providers can be challenging. Maintaining procedural skill and advancing from competent to proficient can be even more difficult. Simple practice and the ‘See One, Do One, Teach One’ model may not be sufficient. This blog covers how to practice a more perfect procedure.