I am pleased to announce two new recipients of Augusta Webster Grants for Educational Innovation at the Feinberg School of Medicine. These two Feinberg faculty submitted proposals in response to a request for applications this spring, seeking investigator-proposed projects in medical education-related scholarship and research. Each principal investigator will be designated an Augusta Webster Faculty Fellow in Medical Education. The grants provide up to $25,000 per year for up to three years. Fourteen proposals were received this cycle, representing six medical school departments, one Center, one program, and two Northwestern McGaw hospitals. Approximately one-third of the proposals focused on undergraduate medical education, one-third on graduate medical education, and the rest on faculty development. A subcommittee of the Education Council served as reviewers and recommended proposals for funding. The two new Augusta Webster Faculty Fellows are:  | Christine Park, MD,is an assistant professor of anesthesiology. Dr. Park’s protocol, Training and assessing novice anesthesiology resident competencies using a simulation-based curriculum, focuses on anesthesiology residents and has implications for patient safety. This is a three-year project. | |  | Melissa Brannen, MD, is an instructor in pediatric critical care in the department of pediatrics. Her study, Using Simulation to Teach Leadership Skills to Pediatric Fellows, was funded for two years. |
The Augusta Webster Grants and the Faculty Fellowships program were established in 1991 by an anonymous donor in honor of Augusta Webster, MD (1903-1993). Dr. Webster, a member of the Class of 1934, was the first woman to be named a full professor at the medical school and in 1960, as chief of obstetrics and gynecology at Cook County Hospital, became the first woman in the country to head a department at a major teaching hospital. |
