Sample Teaching Philosophy Statements
Page 8
Example #7
As a teacher, my goal is to create a learning environment that is conducive to active, engaged
learning. I strive to be evidence-based, to create a safe space for learning and to make the
educational experience fun. This is true whether teaching formally or informally, and whether
my audience consists of medical students, residents, colleagues or patients. My style of
teaching is practical, experiential and occasionally humorous, which I believe leads to a
collaborative learning process that benefits everyone involved.
I am dedicated to always striving to be a more effective educator. Toward this goal, in 2010 I
completed the Teaching Scholars Program at the University of Washington, which offered
formal instruction in how to provide medical education. Team Based Learning (TBL) was one
teaching technique that was introduced, and there is strong evidence from other programs that
student performance and retention improve with TBL. This past year I worked closely with
Robert Steiner, the course director of the Reproduction course for second year medical students
(HUBIO 565) to implement TBL for the first time. This required educating other faculty and
revamping course materials to accommodate the TBL format, moving away from a power
point/lecture format and to working in teams to solve case-based problems. This was a major
effort requiring approximately 100 hours of my time during the past academic year, but was
well worth it. Nationally, I have been involved in improving family planning education for a
broad audience for 7 years. As a member of the national Council on Resident Education in
Obstetrics and Gynecology (CREOG) Education Committee, I drafted, with editorial assistance
from the Committee, the family planning material for the CREOG Educational Objectives which,
under direction from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), serves
as a national education guide for OBGYN residents during their 4 years of training.
My area of expertise is family planning, a topic that has the potential to be divisive. To
overcome this challenge, I make family planning relevant to all, often asking learners to reflect
on their experiences with contraception and/or unintended pregnancy. At the beginning of each
residency year, I hold a 2 hour values clarification session around family planning issues, which
allows residents to speak frankly about their beliefs in a non-judgmental atmosphere and allows
us to set personal goals for each one (quote from a resident evaluation: “I think Dr. Prager
makes an excellent effort to meet people in their comfort zone and probably does far more for
termination training for those that are less comfortable with procedures than taking a more hard-
line approach would do. I am very grateful for her thoughtful approach to things"). In clinical
settings, I model compassionate, high-quality patient care, providing the residents (or medical
students) with tools and words they can use in various – often challenging - clinical situations.
Exposing students to a subject early and often and teaching subject matter in context also
improve learning and academic interest. I direct two medical student electives designed to
introduce learners to OBGYN in practice settings and get them excited about the field before
arriving in the clinic. OBGYN 550 allows students to observe in family planning clinics and also
involves some directed reading and an essay test. OBGYN 505 (created and run in
collaboration with Vicki Mendiratta), is a clinical preceptorship exposing first and second year
medical students to a variety of OBGYN clinical situations. Only these two electives allow
clinical exposure to OBGYN prior to the third year.
Teaching is a part of my daily life as an academic clinician, and I enjoy it tremendously. I take
very seriously the responsibility and privilege of educating patients, students, residents,
colleagues and myself. Given the frequent innovations and discoveries in medicine, both
teaching and learning are on-going processes to which I will continue to dedicate my utmost
attention.