Associate Dean Rural Health and Director Center Rural Health - Office Dean SOM

Position: Associate Dean for Rural Health and Director of the Center for Rural Health - Office of the Dean of the SOM and
University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

Department:
School of Medicine | Department of Family Medicine

Job Title:

Associate Dean for Rural Health and Director of the Center for Rural Health - Open Rank
- Associate, Professor

Position #:

- Requisition #38137:

Job Summary:

This posting represents the confluence of three closely related positions:
1) the Associate Dean for Rural Health in the School of Medicine (SOM), which is an endowed position-the Williams Family Foundation Endowed Chair for Rural Health;
2) the Director of the emerging Center for Rural Health, which will be housed in the Department of Family Medicine (DFM); and
3) the current incumbent leader of the SOM's and DFM's rural activities, who, among many other things, currently directs the SOM's Rural Program. The position to which we are recruiting expands and consolidates these and other rural programs and activities, some with incumbent directors. Because of these related activities, in this

Job Description we will refer to the person in this position simply as the Leader. This Leader will coordinate rural programs and efforts at the Anschutz Medical Campus (AMC), direct rural programs in the Department of Family Medicine (DFM) and coordinate these activities with our multiple external partners and stakeholders.

The Anschutz Medical Campus is one of four University of Colorado campuses located along the front range of the Rocky Mountains; to the east, one-third of the state is rural high plains; and sixty miles west lies the continental divide with the so-called western slope beyond, which also is largely rural. This is a rural state, and the University of Colorado has made the concerns of Colorado's rural citizens a priority since its inception: the president of the university and its regents make regular visits to rural communities;

the schools on the Anschutz Medical Campus (dentistry, nursing, pharmacy, medicine, and public health) all have rural health programs that work closely together; the School of Medicine has a successful medical student Rural Program with a 20-year history; and the Department of Family Medicine (DFM) has a 60-year history of rural education, research, policy work, and engagement with rural clinicians, including two rural practice-based research networks and a policy center with a specific rural emphasis.

We have excellent relations with other academic departments, the other CU health professional schools, various CU academic centers and institutes, and partner across multiple programs with external state and national organizations that have rural interests. These are established relationships that the Director will be expected to maintain and expand as new opportunities arise, under the auspices of an emerging Center for Rural Health.

The Rural Program as it stands today has been under excellent leadership, is stable, has financial reserves, and faces many new or expanded opportunities for further growth and development.

TOTAL FTE COMMITMENT: 1.00

Examples of Work Performed

The duties and responsibilities of the position include, but are not limited to:

Education:

* Medical Student Education

o At the level of the DFM, we have extensive medical student education responsibilities for all medical students, including directing rural clerkships, other rural clinical electives, the Family Medicine Interest Group, participating in the basic clinical skills curriculum, and so on. These have been in place for many years. At the level of the School of Medicine, which operates a year-long Longitudinal Integrated Curriculum (LIC) for second year students, the Rural Program leads and operates this curriculum at 18 rural sites.

These programs have directors and staff that are under the direction of the Leader.

o In addition, the school admits about 10% of each class to a Rural Program, previously called the Rural Track, for a four-year intensive experience in rural medicine. This program has been in existence for 20 years, and is currently led by the Leader, who is a key faculty member, participating in in-person on-campus teaching, teaching of off-campus students via Zoom, rural site visits, mentoring of students, participation in the admissions process, various school committees, and other administrative and budgetary responsibilities along with other Rural Program faculty and staff.

* The University of Colorado Family Medicine Residency Program had a 2-2-2 rural track in Fort Morgan, Colorado which has been closed because of financial difficulties at the hosting FQHC teaching clinic. We are working with the Colorado Association of Family Medicine Residencies to explore where we can start another rural training track.

* The Leader will lead the Colorado Rural Healthcare Workforce Initiative, which is a multi-institutional and multidisciplinary initiative involving 15 programs at 12 public institutions of higher education in Colorado, modeled after the School of Medicine's Rural Program. The Initiative was established and is funded by…