Thread by @michelleko2d

Dear medical schools,
Sympathy statement? Check. WhiteCoats protest? Check. Anti-racism in your admissions & education?

1. Have you asked the Black communities you "serve" how best to support their children so they can become the health professionals at your medical center?

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2. Have you implemented programs to prepare Black college students for *your* medical school?

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3. Do you use the MCAT to screen out applicants, even it mainly predicts USMLE 1 (which is now pass-fail) ? Do you recognize structural racism, rather than fitness for the profession, is what MCAT scores tell you? journals.lww.com/academicmedici…

4. (If you answered No to 1 & 2): Do you actively recruit students from HBCUs & other universities with a strong tradition of supporting Black students? Do you pay the staff who do the work of recruitment for their time?

5. Do you ensure that your admissions committee reflects the communities you serve, not just the faculty who volunteer? Do you compensate your committee members adequately for their time on admissions?

6. Do you silo your admissions committee from your Student Affairs and your "Diversity, Equity & Inclusion" office?

7. Do you unofficially aim for a number of Black students that is "better than last year" or "better than our peers" but does not reflect what is actually needed in the profession?

8. Do you find yourself explaining that you "can't" give preferences based on race, but have you stopped giving preferences for faculty & alumni connections, donor needs, applicants from Ivy/like universities, or whatever you think will boost your US News & World Report ranking.

9. Have you created guiding admission principles which replace health equity / anti racism with "diversity of thought"?

10. Do you ask your applicants, in essays & interviews & experiences, how they see themselves carrying out antiracism and promoting health equity as physicians?

11. Once you have admitted your class that is "more diverse than ever," have you built support services that reflect the actual academic, financial, and emotional needs of your students?

12. Have you stopped blaming your Black students for performing poorly academically, when a) they actually aren't; and b) they are subjected to a continuous barrage of racism from their faculty and fellow students?

13. Have you implemented the necessary curricular reform to teach your students about the impacts of racism on health? Are you providing appropriate training and compensation for your instructors tasked with carrying out this curriculum?

14. Have you prioritized hiring, retaining, and promoting *groups* of Black faculty, which would both improve your capacity to care for Black communities and not harm your Black students?

15. Have you prioritized ability to care for Black communities, understanding of structural and institutional racism, and health equity mission in hiring ALL of your faculty, so that all may engage in the work of training your students and trainees, not only your Black faculty?

16. See #15, but for residents and fellows.

17. Have you actively worked to promote Black faculty and support their scholarship, and not only offered positions that have "Diversity" "Inclusion" or "Multicultural" in their titles?

18. Across *all* educational lines, both clinical & didactic, do you teach health "disparities" but not historic structural & institutional racism as drivers?

19. Have you noticed that you're standing in front of a fabulously shiny biomedical research building when you tell your Black students there is no money for scholarships, hiring Black faculty, or paying Black faculty for the anti-racism work that they do?

20. Checks 1-19? Seriously considered whether US health policy deserves to be centered in medical care, & whether channeling part of the $$ should have gone to uplifting Black communities & centering policy on public health would have saved more lives in COVID-19?