September 8, 2009

Medical Faculty Senate Steering Committee

Meeting Minutes

Attendees:  Jill Baren, M.D., M.B.E., Greg Bashaw, Ph.D., R. Michael Buckley, M.D., Emma Furth, M.D., Peter Kantesky, Ph.D., Michael Levine, M.D., Jonni Moore, Ph.D., Victoria Mulhern, Anne Reilly, M.D., Deborah Sesok-Pizzini, M.D., Joseph Straton, M.D., Susan Weiss, Ph.D.

Dr. Emma Furth welcomed the Committee to the first meeting of the 2009 – 2010 Medical Faculty Senate Steering Committee.  Dr. Furth explained that there is a website for the Medical Faculty Senate Steering Committee that includes the minutes from past meetings, upcoming events, members and bylaws.  She reviewed that the role of the Committee is to be the voice of the faculty and to provide access to the leadership and the administration of Penn Medicine.  The Committee can make recommendations to the Dean and Dr. Furth announced that she will be scheduling ongoing one-on-one meetings with Dr. Rubenstein. 

Dr. Furth discussed some of the past accomplishments of the Steering Committee. These accomplishments include:  

• Teaching Initiative – The Committee developed this initiative to provide faculty of all ranks tools to enhance their teaching.  In this initiative, all new junior faculty must complete two teaching programs through the Advance, faculty professional development program and the overview of teaching at Penn Medicine program.  These courses must be completed prior to the faculty member’s initial reappointment.  This initiative has the full support of the Dean. 
• Career Development Plan – This initiative was developed to provide faculty with an opportunity to have a one-to-one meeting with their Chair or Division Chief to review their performance and productivity in the past year and discuss goals for the upcoming year.  A template for self assessment was created that does not have to be used but could serve as a tool to guide the discussion.  This program is also fully supported by the Dean. 
• Members of the Steering Committee presented information about the Medical Faculty Senate and its accomplishments in the past years to the majority of departments throughout the SOM.

Dr. Furth reported that in this academic year, the Committee will have small group discussions with random faculty in a confidential manner to assess the response to the teaching initiative and the career development plan and to obtain feedback on the role of the Medical Faculty Senate Steering Committee.

There was discussion about the experiences some of the Committee had during their career development meetings. It was agreed that increased communication about the value of these meetings may need to occur.

Respectfully submitted,

Joseph Straton, M.D.