Community Events

Date and Time: January 14, 2025, 3 p.m. EST
Presenters: Thad E. Wilson, PhD, University of Kentucky, and Christopher M. Schonhoff, PhD, Boston University School of Medicine
Moderators: Ryan Downey, PhD, American University of the Caribbean and Lisa Carney Anderson, PhD, University of Minnesota

Learn about solutions and approaches to teaching physiology more effectively and maintaining the identity of physiology within integrated organs-based medical and health professional curricula. There will be two short presentations with time for small breakout discussions after each presentation.

Register for the January Medical Physiology Education Session

Date and Time: January 15, 2025, 3 p.m. EST
Presenters: Layla Al-Nakkash, PhD, Erin Bruce, PhD, Justin Cobb, PhD, Suzan Kamel-ElSayed, DVM, PhD, Marisol Lopez, PhD, Donika Rakacolli, PhD, and Rebecca Petre Sullivan, PhD
Moderators and Organizers: Layla Al-Nakkash, PhD and Marisol Lopez, PhD

This year, the Career Development Hours are focusing on inclusive teaching practices. Join us at this community building session and:

• Preview the programming for the year.
• Share your ideas for future topics and presenters.
• Build community among physiology professionals.

All are welcome to participate!

Register for the January Career Development Hour

Date and Time: February 13, 2025, 4:30 p.m. EST
Moderator and Presenter: Joel Michael, PhD, Rush Medical College

In introducing your students to core concepts here are three questions to think about:

• When do I introduce them?
• How do I introduce them?
• How will I assess whether students understand them?

Register for the February Core Concepts Huddle

Date and Time: February 18, 2025, 4 p.m. EST
Presenter: Louise Lexis, PhD, and Brianna Julien, PhD, La Trobe University, Australia
Moderator and Organizer: Etain Tansey, PhD, Queen’s University Belfast, U.K.

Join co-authors Louise Lexis, PhD, and Brianna Julien, PhD, for a presentation on their decade-long research, “A Blended Learning Exercise Physiology Theory Module That Supports Student Autonomy and Improves Academic Performance.” This session will showcase an innovative teaching scaffold that fostered student autonomy and resulted in high student satisfaction ratings. The presentation will also cover the study design, key results and implications for future educational practices.

Register for the Journal Club

Date and Time: March 11, 2025, 5 p.m. EST
Presenter: Lisa Anderson, PhD, University of Minnesota
Organizer: Beth Beason-Abmayr, PhD, Rice University

As the course director of a first-year medical physiology, Anderson emphasizes the use of learning objectives that are explicitly aligned with formative assessments in and outside of class. In an online survey and focus group interviews, the students in this study reported that they valued critical thinking, but misunderstood expectations on exams. Few students used learning objectives for studying purposes. After presenting the findings from this study, medical physiology education in the face of pass/fail and integrated curricula will be discussed.

Register for the Journal Club

Date and Time: March 19, 2025, 3 p.m. EST
Moderators and Presenters: Erin Bruce, PhD and Rebecca Petre Sullivan, PhD

This year, the Career Development Hours are focusing on inclusive teaching practices. Join us at this session which focuses on inclusive practices in assessment.

Objectives include:

• Identifying barriers to success in assessment
• Discuss how to design assessments that mitigate bias, including examples
• Review rubrics as an assessment tool (both for direct assessment and to help educators develop equitable

All are welcome to participate!

Register for the Career Development Hour

Throughout 2023, working groups will continue to update the more than 500 resources currently offered by the Center. These working groups are asking for your help to gather accessible, high-impact resources to add to the resource libraries. The working groups are considering resources for these current and anticipated resource libraries:

• Evidence-based teaching practices,
• Inclusive teaching,
• Teaching homeostasis,
• Physiology education research,
• Advising, and
• Physiology curriculum development at the undergraduate, graduate, and medical school levels.

Do you know a high-impact resource that would benefit physiology educators? If so, email the title and a link to the resource to APS Learning, apslearning@physiology.org for consideration. Please make sure to indicate which topic the resource addresses.

The Center needs your help developing and supporting our educator community. We are looking for a diverse group of contributors with various types of teaching experience and encourage anyone eager to learn about teaching and learning to volunteer. Even if you do not have teaching experience yet, we could use your help. Please complete the volunteer form to help us connect you with volunteer opportunities that match your interests, knowledge and passions.