Personal Statement
I have had the privilege to have great educators throughout my professional development. They encouraged me not only to self-learn, but to learn by teaching others as well. When I think about how I would put my educational philosophy into words, I can best describe my goals with each learner in a similar fashion - encourage self-learning, and educate in a way that allows them to become good educators.
When I?m working with either an individual or group of learners, I feel that my purpose is to teach more than just information. Information can be obtained from self-study, reading, and experience. I try to focus more on teaching concepts and thought processes. Understanding how to apply information to a specific setting is what leads to good clinicians. Base knowledge is important, but even more so is the ability to appropriately employ it.
My role at UNM within the emergency department and the International Mountain Medicine Center couples me with learners of varying levels, including, pre-med students, medical students, residents, fellows, paramedics, PAs, NPs, and attending physicians of varying specialties. I teach in the classroom, while on shift, and in extreme environments out in the mountains and alpine terrain. One of my strengths within this role is adapting the important concepts to the students in front of me, in their current environment, to make learning as applicable as possible. I push learners in both knowledge, thought processes, and improvisation that helps to solidify concepts and maximize takeaway. Through our wilderness medicine education programs, I?ve also been able to learn the importance of utilizing current technology to improve and streamline education. In the age of social media and instant access, allowing newer generation learners to access content such as videos, discussion forums, quizzes, etc., when it is most feasible for learning to occur.
For the future, I plan to continue to adapt to the learners in front of me, to discuss their learning styles, and to continue a multi-modal approach to teaching both knowledge and concepts. Course and learner evaluations are an ideal way to monitor the effectiveness of current strategies, and I pay special attention to the comments and suggestions of those I have educated. I feel that I can often learn as much from the learners as they can from me.
In the grand scheme of things, one of my biggest drivers is the realization that those we are currently teaching will be the future educators. Being an educator is a privilege, and I have accountability to all learners that I encounter to impart the highest quality instruction possible.
Gender
Male