Juno News - August 02, 2020


＂Culturally safe, anti-colonial＂ medical school？


Episode Stats

Length

4 minutes

Words per Minute

158.91847

Word Count

768

Sentence Count

30


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Queen's University Medical School has recently announced a revamped program called the Queen's
00:00:09.120 University Accelerated Route to Medical School, or QUARMS, where 10 seats at the medical school
00:00:14.880 will be reserved for Black and Indigenous students only. This program has existed since 2012, but it
00:00:21.960 used to be open to everyone. But as of this year, it will become an ethnicity-based program. If you
00:00:28.620 look at the previous successful QUARMS applicants from past years, there's definitely some ethnic
00:00:34.260 diversity there, but alas, just not the right kind of diversity, I suppose. The successful applicants
00:00:41.460 to QUARMS will not have to take the MCAT, which is the standardized test for medical school admission,
00:00:47.060 and if everything goes well, they will graduate with an MD in six years, as opposed to the usual
00:00:52.320 eight. QUARMS used to be known as a program of academic excellence, where students would have,
00:00:58.500 you know, averages ranging from 95 to 100% in high school. But now it's kind of unclear whether
00:01:04.860 or not that is the expectation. This initiative was announced just after Jane Philpott became dean
00:01:10.780 of Queen's Faculty of Health Sciences. If you recall, Philpott was the former Liberal MP who was kicked
00:01:16.840 out of caucus over the SMZ-Lavalin affair. In a news release announcing the QUARMS program, we read,
00:01:23.700 Queen's recognizes that Indigenous peoples and Black Canadians have been historically underrepresented in
00:01:29.920 the medical profession, and that standard medical admissions practices have imposed barriers to these
00:01:35.220 groups. Barriers is a pretty vague term, so I reached out to the Faculty of Health Sciences and asked them
00:01:41.420 if they could provide me with one or two examples of a barrier that Black and Indigenous students face
00:01:47.580 when filling out a medical school application. The answer I received over email said,
00:01:54.060 one, because Black and Indigenous students are underrepresented in medical school,
00:01:58.900 there is decreased access to social networks, informal connections, role models that can assist
00:02:03.480 during the application process. Now, that kind of strikes me as more of a class issue. You know,
00:02:10.160 you're standing in life, what kind of family you were born into generationally, what your family has done,
00:02:18.040 but no matter. Two, Black and Indigenous applicants face implicit bias during assessment and application
00:02:24.820 processes, and the interest in applying to professional schools may be limited by fear of
00:02:29.840 bias and discrimination. Now, they're taking the idea of implicit bias as a given here, but it is a
00:02:37.580 contested term. Next, the news release says, our faculty aims to become a leader in Canada in
00:02:43.500 cultural safety, anti-racism, anti-colonialism, and anti-oppression in health professions education.
00:02:50.140 Now, this statement, again, is pretty vague and ambiguous, so I reached out to Queens for comment
00:02:55.140 and asked, can you please give me one or two examples of how you envision a culturally safe,
00:03:01.300 anti-racist, anti-colonial, anti-oppressive health professions education? You know, for people who are
00:03:07.420 not familiar with these concepts, what does this look like? The reply I got said, anti-racist health
00:03:15.920 professional education, one, is inclusive, with acknowledgement and respect for different lived
00:03:21.080 experiences. Two, promotes self-awareness and reflection on issues such as power and social
00:03:26.520 justice. I totally get it now. But really, I mean, I was hoping for some concrete examples
00:03:33.120 about additions or changes to the medical school curriculum, but I think a lot of the time when
00:03:39.340 people talk about these vague concepts, like diversity and inclusion, they don't even really
00:03:44.140 know what they're talking about, or they are purposely using the vagueness of those terms
00:03:48.660 to mask any kind of agenda they might have that they don't want other people to know about.
00:03:53.620 A lot of the time, these diversity quota medical school programs will advertise themselves
00:03:58.680 as programs that make no compromises on academic excellence. They are simply making these applicants
00:04:04.260 feel more comfortable during the admissions process. So, for example, an applicant might be
00:04:10.560 interviewed by a faculty member with the same skin color that they have. So these programs emphasize
00:04:16.200 that even though these students are basically given these opportunities because of their race,
00:04:21.460 they are still academically outstanding students, which I don't doubt. But then I ask,
00:04:26.300 what is the point? Because we know that there is a stigma that forms with these types of affirmative
00:04:31.140 action programs where people start to think, oh, well, you're a part of a minority group.
00:04:36.440 You got the easy way in, whether that's true or not. And I think it's a disservice for these medical
00:04:42.860 students at Queens to have that stigma on them. I'm Lindsay Shepard with True North. Thanks so much for
00:04:49.680 watching.