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Leading change: Curriculum reform in graduate education in the biomedical sciences
Author(s) -
Dasgupta Shoumita,
Symes Karen,
Hyman Linda
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
biochemistry and molecular biology education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.34
H-Index - 39
eISSN - 1539-3429
pISSN - 1470-8175
DOI - 10.1002/bmb.20862
Subject(s) - curriculum , general partnership , variety (cybernetics) , process (computing) , gateway (web page) , medical education , curriculum mapping , curriculum development , restructuring , curriculum studies , curriculum theory , engineering ethics , sociology , pedagogy , medicine , political science , computer science , engineering , artificial intelligence , world wide web , law , operating system
The Division of Graduate Medical Sciences at the Boston University School of Medicine houses numerous dynamic graduate programs. Doctoral students began their studies with laboratory rotations and classroom training in a variety of fundamental disciplines. Importantly, with 15 unique pathways of admission to these doctoral programs, there were also 15 unique curricula. Departments and programs offered courses independently, and students participated in curricula that were overlapping combinations of these courses. This system created curricula that were not coordinated and that had redundant course content as well as content gaps. A partnership of key stakeholders began a curriculum reform process to completely restructure doctoral education at the Boston University School of Medicine. The key pedagogical goals, objectives, and elements designed into the new curriculum through this reform process created a curriculum designed to foster the interdisciplinary thinking that students are ultimately asked to utilize in their research endeavors. We implemented comprehensive student and peer evaluation of the new Foundations in Biomedical Sciences integrated curriculum to assess the new curriculum. Furthermore, we detail how this process served as a gateway toward creating a more fully integrated graduate experience, under the umbrella of the Program in Biomedical Sciences. © 2015 by The International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 43(2):126–132, 2015.