Alice L. Walton School of Medicine (AWSOM) is seeking experienced, motivated, and dedicated leaders and educators to participate in the design and delivery of an innovative four-year medical school curriculum that engages medical students in active and novel learning.

Job Description:

Job Title: Faculty Part time position; Behavioral Sciences Course Director with an allocation for clinical skills educator.

Reports to: Chair, Medical Education Department

FLSA Classification:

Location: Bentonville, Arkansas (On-site)

Date Reviewed:

Who We Are 

Founded in 2021, Alice L. Walton School of Medicine (AWSOM) is a nonprofit, four-year MD program that will enhance traditional medical education with the arts, humanities, and whole health principles. The school’s culture embraces self-care to empower students to care for their own well-being as well as their patients. The school’s state-of-the-art medical education facility is located in Bentonville, Arkansas on the Crystal Bridges campus, home to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and Heartland Whole Health Institute. The school has been granted preliminary accreditation status by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education.

About The Position

The faculty part-time role will consist of Behavioral Sciences Course Director and Clinical Skills Educator.  This is a part-time faculty position with an appointment of up to 0.3 FTE.

Behavioral Sciences Course Director serves as the academic and operational leader for the Behavioral Sciences course (MEDI 8200) within AWSOM's foundational sciences curriculum. The Course Director is responsible for the design, delivery, assessment, evaluation, faculty coordination, curriculum mapping, and continuous quality improvement of an integrated course focused on human behavior, behavioral development, coping and adaptation, mental health, behavioral disorders, and the biological, psychological, social, and cultural factors that influence health and disease. The course integrates behavioral science concepts with relevant neuroanatomy, genetics, pathophysiology, clinical medicine, and whole health principles to prepare students for clinical practice and success on the USMLE examinations. The Course Director collaborates with foundational and clinical science faculty to develop integrated learning experiences, clinical cases, and assessments that reinforce behavioral science concepts throughout the curriculum.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Develop and Integrate Behavioral Sciences Curriculum. Oversee the development, implementation and integration of all content tied to Behavioral Sciences, including the development of clinically relevant narratives and various assessment tools including, but not limited to, NBME-style multiple-choice questions and assessment of student performance in active learning sessions.
• Direct all aspects of the Behavioral Sciences course, including planning, implementation, delivery, evaluation, and continuous improvement.
• Participate in curriculum mapping, curricular integration reviews, and annual curriculum evaluation activities.
• Identify opportunities to address content gaps, redundancies, and sequencing issues through data-informed course improvement.
• Teach/Instruct/Facilitate. Actively engage in student instruction, developing and delivering content using active learning methodologies. Collaborate with faculty colleagues to create and deliver pre-session and in-session flipped classroom content. Facilitate small and large group active learning; serve as facilitator for small group discussion such as in case-based learning (CBL), and other small group sessions.
• Assessments/Evaluations. Develop and maintain course learning objectives and map them to the curriculum. Use appropriate assessment methods and performance metrics to ensure students achieve course objectives. Develop, review, and revise formative and summative assessments, including NBME-style examination items. Collaborate with faculty and staff to support continuous quality improvement of courses, sessions, activities, and assessments.
• Grow Professionally. Participate in professional development programs to enhance teaching, educational and other skills needed to execute their responsibilities.
• Other. Perform other duties as assigned.

Clinical Skills Educator at a .1 FTE

• Role Description
  • Oversee students’ performance in the AWSOM Clinical Skills Lab, providing both verbal and written constructive feedback. Their supervision will focus on key areas including patient-centered interviewing, physical examination skills, professionalism, clinical reasoning, shared decision-making, patient management, oral case presentation, and medical documentation.
• Time Commitment: The estimated time commitment is up to eight hours weekly.
• Duties and Expectations:
  • Assist in the instruction and implementation of the Early Clinical Skills & Experiences I-IV courses where medical students will learn patient-centered interviewing, physical examination, medical documentation, professionalism, procedural skills, clinical reasoning, and shared patient-centered management planning.
  • Work with standardized patients (SPs) in small group activities.
  • Assist in the facilitation, implementation, and grading of performance-based clinical skills assessments such as providing formative feedback, grading objective structured clinical examinations (OSCEs), and other types of assessments within the clinical curriculum.
  • Be committed to excellence in instruction, facilitation, assessment, and mentoring medical students.
  • Preference is for clinical skills educators to be consistently committed to helping deliver the curriculum on Wednesday afternoon sessions. Consistent commitment improves feedback and improves assessment of the students.

Qualifications and Requirements

• Doctoral degree (MD, DO, PhD, PsyD, MD/PhD, or equivalent) with training and expertise in behavioral sciences, psychiatry, psychology, behavioral medicine, medical sociology, or a closely related field, required.

Physical Demands and Work Environment

The physical demands and work environment characteristics described here are representative of those required by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this position. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform these functions.

Physical Demands: In the work environment described, position requires sitting at a desk and utilizing a computer and a telephone for prolonged periods of time and good eye/hand coordination, bending and stretching, and physical stamina to lift and transport a minimum of 10 pounds. Visual acuity to review written materials is required for this job.

Work Environment: Work is performed part-time in a professional, climate-controlled office environment with standard office equipment, including computers, printers, and telephones. Schedule and workload will vary based on assigned FTE and business needs.  This role requires working in an open setting near colleagues. The noise level is typically low to moderate. The role also requires interaction with both the public and internal team members in a professional and courteous manner. Some local travel will be required, and a flexible schedule may be necessary to accommodate business needs, including occasional evening and weekend work hours.

Alice L. Walton School of Medicine is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment.

All offers of employment are contingent on your successful completion (where permitted by state law) of a confidentiality agreement and background check.  In addition, you will need to provide proper identification verifying your eligibility to work in the United States.