training – UofL News

UofL awarded nearly $4M to close skills gap

Baylee Pulliam — Fri, 28 Feb 2020 14:51:53 +0000

The University of Louisville has received nearly $4 million from the U.S. Department of Labor to build a program that will prepare students for the ever-evolving, technology-enabled “jobs of tomorrow.”

The competitive federal grant was announced by U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a UofL grad.��

The UofL Modern Apprenticeship Pathways to Success (MAPS) program is funded through the DoL’s “” initiative. UofL was one of just 28 public-private partnerships funded under this federal program in its most recent round, and is the only one in Kentucky.

Through MAPS, UofL will create apprenticeships that connect what students learn in class with their eventual careers. The apprenticeships will also give them field experience with disruptive, cutting-edge technologies that can change how work is done.

“At UofL, we recognize that many people entering such industries as advanced manufacturing, healthcare and information technology require new skill sets or retraining in order to be successful,” said UofL President Neeli Bendapudi. “The apprenticeships created by the university and its private-sector partners through this grant program will help to form the workforce of the future.”

UofL will also work with three academic partners — Webster University, Jefferson Community and Technical College and Elizabethtown Community and Technical College. These institutions will help MAPS create transfer opportunities for associate’s degree holders who want to earn a bachelor’s degree, and connect with underrepresented minority students and those who are, have been or depend on a member of the military.

Principal investigator Dr. Jeffrey Sun, of the UofL College of ��ֱ�� and Human Development (CEHD), said preparing students for high-skilled jobs is especially important now, at a time when the world of work is increasingly disrupted and evolving due to technologies like artificial intelligence and automation.

According to a from the Brookings Institute, automation will be most disruptive in the Heartland, and especially in Kentucky and Indiana. In the Louisville Metropolitan Statistical Area alone, the report says some 670,000 jobs are susceptible.

But while automation may replace some jobs, some reports show it creates others — ones companies can’t seem to fill due to the skills gap. According to a from Deloitte, advanced technologies in the manufacturing industry will cause an estimated 2.4 million positions to go unfilled between 2018 and 2028.

“The workforce in the Heartland is underemployed, mostly due to manufacturing layoffs and the unpreparedness of workers for higher-skilled jobs,” said Sun, associate dean for Innovation and Strategic Partnerships at the CEHD. “We want our students at UofL to be prepared when new technologies, such as robotics and AI, alter our work or the market shifts, perhaps from 3D printing, change our business model.”

“By equipping job seekers with the training they need for good, 21st-century jobs, we can help close the skills gap and build upon Kentucky’s growing economy,”��McConnell said in a release.��“I applaud President Trump for his administration’s focus on apprenticeship programs, and I’m proud to work with him to promote investment in the future of Kentucky’s workers and their families. As Senate Majority Leader, I’m in a better position than ever to deliver for Kentucky communities, and I was proud to partner with UofL to give Kentucky workers every opportunity to succeed.”

Cultural Center hosts cultural resilience training, Conocimiento

Haeli Spears — Thu, 19 Sep 2019 15:24:18 +0000

During the day-long training, participants map out their immigration timelines and discuss their various ethnic backgrounds. These activities are intended to help participants connect their lived experiences to vital skills such as adaptability and cross-cultural communication.

At the heart of the UofL Cultural Center’s����ǲԴǳ��Գٴ��is cultural resilience,��meaning skills gained from life experiences often informed by one’s own background and traditions.��The center will host this cultural resilience training during the spring semester, its fifth time doing so, and its second year partnering with JB Speed School.��

“The goal is for students to raise their consciousness of themselves and their relationship to society,” said Sarah Nuñez, associate director of the Cultural Center.

Nuñez and Marcos Morales, former UofL student and current program coordinator at the Cultural Center, adapted����ǲԴǳ��Գٴ��for a university setting from E3: ��ֱ��, Excellence, and Equity, an organization that identifies five 21st century global skills needed by each person: Innovation, critical analysis, cross-cultural communication, teamwork and adaptability.

“We believe we get [those skills] from lived experiences we have every single day and even growing up,” Nuñez said. “We all have these unique gifts from the lived experiences.”

Both Nuñez and Morales see myriad benefits for those who participate, especially a deeper understanding of and respect for themselves.

“Students get a chance to pause and look at their garden … and see the fruits that are waiting to be picked right there,” Morales said. “You being able to function with your friends, and then go and interpret for your mom at the doctor’s, that’s cross-cultural communication.”

Morales, who participated in the training during his senior year, personally attests to the value of��Conocimiento.

“It was the very first time I brought my latinidad (various��characteristics shared by Latin American individuals) into an educational space,” he said. “I think [Conocimiento] impacts students here in that they get to become more proud of their latinidad in higher ed, and that’s a big role of our office as a whole.”

Nuñez adds that����ǲԴǳ��Գٴ��prepares students for their time at UofL, especially as student leaders.

“The stronger you are within yourself, the more that you have the ability to represent, to stand for and with other groups … and to build up whatever the organization’s goal or mission is,” said Nuñez. “So, from a student leadership perspective, I think a training like this gives them skills to step into leadership roles.”

Going forward, Nuñez and Morales would like to expand Conocimiento while still maintaining its personal element.

“There’s a lot that happens when people come together and talk; a lot comes forward,” said Nuñez. “Even more comes forward when they’re given a space to talk, and to deep dive, and to build connections with one another.”

Last year’s training included 45 participants. Participation levels have increased in each of the four years the training has been held. Nuñez expects that trajectory to continue, as the percentage of Latino students in the area is expected to grow by 53% through 2023.

UofL School of Medicine faculty complete leadership training

Betty Coffman — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 13:24:35 +0000

Sixteen members of the University of Louisville School of Medicine faculty have completed a 10-month training program aimed at developing effective future leaders in academic medicine. Leadership and Innovation in Academic Medicine (LIAM) was designed to develop innovative thinking skills in early to mid-career faculty who are motivated to be leaders in medical education.

“Leadership is more important than ever as the university prepares to deal with changes in our health care world. Our leaders need to have the resilience and creativity and the ability to be innovative and problem solve as challenges keep coming,” said Gerard Rabalais, MD, M.H.A., associate dean of faculty development, who created the program along with Staci Saner, MEd, program manager for faculty development.

“We need to deepen our bench here at the university,” said Tracy Eells, PhD, MBA, vice provost for faculty affairs, at the program’s final event on July 17. “We need to have a deep set of leaders that we can turn to because there are a lot of leadership positions at the university.”

The participants attended monthly meetings organized to introduce innovation and design thinking through understanding how to lead oneself, how to lead others and how to lead the organization.

Jeremy Clark, MD, assistant professor in the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, most values the connections he made with other participants.

“The single most impactful aspect of LIAM is the��relationships I��built��with each of my peers and with our physician leaders in the School of Medicine. I now have 15 other young leaders that I can go to and ask for advice and counsel when I am struggling with leadership problems,” Clark said.

Hugh Shoff, MD, assistant professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine, expected the program to help him acquire tools for becoming a better leader and innovator in medicine. He was surprised by the value of the self-reflection aspect.

“We spent lot of time in the beginning learning to analyze yourself and make sure you as a person are in the right place to become a better leader. I didn’t expect to spend as much time on that, but I am glad we did,” Shoff said.

Eells said self-leadership is a critical aspect of the program’s three-stage approach.

“It has to start with yourself, with emotional intelligence, knowing how to keep your cool when you are in a tense situation since you are serving as a role model to many others around you when you are serving in a leadership capacity,” Eells said.

The self-reflection portion will be expanded for the second LIAM cohort, which will increase from 16 to 24 members.

At the program’s final meeting, teams of four participants presented projects to improve the school or health care in general and presented them to a panel of judges, leaders from the UofL School of Medicine, and members of the 2018-2019 cohort were announced.

2018-19 LIAM cohort

Pascale Alard, PhD�� Microbiology and Immunology
Thomas Altstadt, MD�� Neurosurgery
Laura Bishop, MD�� Medicine
Eric Burton, MD�� Neurology
Camilo Castillo, MD�� Neurosurgery
Priya Chandan, MD, MPH�� Neurosurgery
Brittany Chapman, MD�� Neurology
Lynzee Cornell, PhD�� Otolaryngology and Communicative Disorders
Russell Farmer, MD�� Surgery
Shahab Ghafghazi, MD�� Medicine
Josephine Gomes, MD�� Family and Geriatric Medicine
Sushil Gupta, MD�� Pediatrics
Ahmed Haddad, MD, PhD�� Urology
Jennifer Hamm, MD�� Obstetrics, Gynecology and Women’s Health
David Haustein, MD�� Neurosurgery
Bridget Hittepole, MD�� Medicine
Deborah Kozik, MD�� Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery
Rana Latif, MD�� Anesthesiology
Jennifer Le, MD�� Pediatrics
Eli Pendleton, MD�� Family and Geriatric Medicine
Melissa Potts, MD�� Radiology
Vikas Singh, MD�� Medicine
Abigail Stocker, MD�� Medicine
Christina Terrell, MD�� Psychiatry

2017-2018 LIAM class projects

Increasing the Value of Academic Teaching��

Academic teaching is a core mission for UofL School of Medicine faculty that is difficult to quantify in terms of scholarly recognition. The definition and documentation of good teaching is lacking. Our project proposes a structured way of accounting for teaching in an easily accessible system, and ideas for a culture shift towards recognition of teaching excellence as a critical mission for the university. Team members:��Alexander Ovechkin, MD, PhD, Christine Brady, PhD, Elizabeth Cash, PhD, Kathrin LaFaver, MD.

A Better PICC Line

The project focuses on the creation of a PICC line that is tamper-evident for use in patients who have a history of IV drug use and require long-term antibiotic therapy for conditions such as bacterial endocarditis. The hope is that use of this PICC line will allow these patients to transition home for IV antibiotics in lieu of prolonged hospital stays to complete the antibiotics course. Team members:��Farid Kehdy, MD, Hugh Shoff, MD, Laura Workman, MD, Luz Fernandez, MD.

Mind the Gap: ��Using Generational Strengths to Create Faculty-Student Teaching Partnerships
Many University of Louisville Health Sciences Center faculty struggle to adapt their teaching to include new educational pedagogies due to lack of time, variable prioritization of teaching and difficulty using new technology. We propose the creation of student-faculty partnerships where the faculty – our content experts – can use the technical savvy and availability of students to modify and improve their teaching. We plan to pilot this initiative as part of the Medical Students as Teachers elective for fourth year medical students and measure change in course evaluations, student satisfaction and faculty well-being. Team members:��Leah Siskind, PhD, Sara Multerer, MD, Sara Petruska, MD, Tyler Sharpe, MD.

Financial Empowerment
Leaders in academic medicine are frequently ill prepared to make the financial decisions that are a necessary part of their jobs. There is currently a gap between finance officers��at senior levels and leaders at lower levels who lead clinical, research or education��teams. Our proposed innovation is to empower leaders across the University of Louisville School of Medicine to make financial decisions by providing local, focused financial training to leaders. Team members:��Carolyn Roberson, PhD, Adrienne Jordan, MD, Brian Holland, MD, Jeremy Clark, MD.

UofL resident physician to deliver research at national ophthalmology conference

Betty Coffman — Fri, 26 Jan 2018 13:55:43 +0000

Joshua C. Gross, MD, a first-year resident��with the UofL Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, will present his research at the annual meeting of the��on Jan. 26 in Austin, Texas. Gross will present his research into the association between reduced blood flow in the retina and a more rapid progression of open-angle glaucoma in patients��with diabetes mellitus.��

Open-angle glaucoma��is��a chronic and��multi-faceted disease that causes��optic nerve damage and visual field loss, and if left untreated��can eventually lead to blindness. One of the most important risk factors for the development of open-angle glaucoma is high eye pressure.��It��is��the second leading cause of blindness worldwide, and is expected to affect about 3 million Americans by the year��2020.��

Working with colleagues at Indiana University School of Medicine Department of Ophthalmology and in Italy, Gross found that diabetic open-angle glaucoma��patients who had reduced retinal blood flow experienced faster glaucomatous optic nerve��and��visual field��deterioration than��glaucoma��patients without��diabetes.

UofL researchers get tips on getting inventions to market

Mark Hebert — Thu, 17 Mar 2016 15:23:18 +0000

“I’ve sat in a room with a venture capitalist who told an inventor ‘it IS your baby but your baby is ugly’”.�� That quip from Bruce Gingles, vice president of Cook Medical, brought a big laugh from the 30�� University of Louisville researchers attending a session of UofL’s Trifecta Life-Science Translational Training Program. Co-organizer Holly Clark says the series of five sessions is “designed to educate our innovators on the many paths to commercializing their inventions and life science technologies.”

Gingles and other speakers have brought UofL researchers a wealth of knowledge on “making good pitches to investors, partners and stakeholders, regulatory reimbursements, protecting intellectual property, marketing and dealing with potential roadblocks” to getting a life science product to market according to Jessica Sharon, program co-organizer.

Gingles, whose company is the largest privately owned medical products manufacturer in the world, told the entrepreneurs the human impact of their invention “will have the most impact on your success, not how much money it might make.”�� He offered advice on forming a start-up company versus licensing a technology while adding insight into how Cook Medical decides which inventions to pursue.

A second speaker, Dr. Cedric Francois�� of Apellis Pharmaceuticals, told the group that ��creating and running a start up company has its challenges but great potential for reward.�� Francois is overseeing his second entrepreneurial venture after the first was acquired by a major industry player. His current company ��recently raised $47.1 Million.�� Francois agreed with Gingles�� that team development is paramount to the success of commercialization and that either the licensing or startup path can lead to the same outcome—getting products to market!

UofL is placing an emphasis on getting more faculty to translate and commercialize the inventions they discover at UofL so providing information and identifying resources to make the process easier is a big help to researchers according to Clark.

Radiologist Chin Ng has attended all of the sessions, which he describes as “the training we never got in school”. Ng is developing a novel laser to treat cancer. “I’m a researcher so I know how to write research grant proposals and publish papers” he said. “But these information sessions have taught me I need to stay focused on other things if I hope to get my invention to the marketplace”.

Jill Steinbach-Rankins is a bioengineer who knew that making a pitch to entrepreneurs or investors is outside the norm for an engineer but she’s excited about the opportunity to learn.

The series of seminars includes the name “trifecta” because UofL is the only institution in the country to have received three prestigious translational grants – Coulter Translational Partnership, the NSF I-Corps program and the NIH REACH/UofL ExCITE Award.