Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Building the Most Equitable, Inclusive Medical School Nationally
At UCSF’s School of Medicine, diversity is a critical component of institutional success. But achieving the goal of advancing health worldwide and across our City requires continual work to ensure that the environments in which medical students learn, care, and discover are not only diverse but open, equitable, and inclusive.
UCSF and its School of Medicine believe that equitable and inclusive environments are essential to highquality patient care, effective learning, and cutting-edge discovery.
In 2015, that commitment was formalized at UCSF with the launch of Differences Matter, a five-year, multimillion dollar initiative supported by the School of Medicine Dean's Office.
The School is developing and implementing strategies that will increase diversity in the academic community, train all learners to more effectively treat diverse patient populations, deliver more equitable care to our communities, design clinical research that is more inclusive of minorities and people from underserved groups, and eliminate disparities in accessing medical education opportunities.
Collaborative work at UCSF is underway to address both structural racism and interpersonal biases that contribute to inequities in healthcare for patients and education for students.
These include:
- Full-day training workshops on equity, inclusion, and bias
- Updated UCSF MD competency milestones focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion
- A committee to support educators to engage in equity pedagogy, created by the School’s Academy of Medical Educators
- Medical student orientation that challenges students to address healthcare disparities by individually and collectively learning about equity, inclusion, and bias
Faculty and Staff Training
More than 1,800 faculty and staff have been trained about micro-aggressions, unconscious bias, privilege, and how to be allies, through Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Champion Training.
Curriculum Changes
Social justice has been integrated throughout the four-year School of Medicine curriculum. The school also revised its competency milestones to require all students to graduate with competencies related to sensitivity to race/ethnicity and social justice.
Elimination of Grades in Core Clerkships
The School of Medicine eliminated honors grades in core clerkships to improve equity and wellbeing.
Learn more about Diversity, Equity and Inclusion student programs