Salzer Receives Hickman Award at Education Day

Photo of Kevin Kane and William Salzer.
William Salzer, MD, right, receives the Jane Hickman Teaching Award from associate dean for education improvement Kevin Kane, MD, during an Education Day awards ceremony. The Hickman Award is the highest honor for medical education bestowed by MU.

William Salzer, MD, won the highest honor in medical education bestowed by the University of Missouri — the Jane Hickman Teaching Award — on Thursday during the School of Medicine’s annual Education Day.

Salzer, a professor of clinical medicine, joined the MU faculty in 1992.

“He has been a huge contributor to the patient-based learning curriculum as a case and exam writer since the inception of PBL 25 years ago,” said Kevin Kane, MD, the associate dean for education improvement. “He also serves as an attending physician in internal medicine in both inpatient and outpatient settings and has mentored hundreds of students, residents and fellows over the years.”

Senior associate dean of education and faculty development Michael Hosokawa, EdD, the chairman of the Hickman Award committee, said Salzer is “student-centered, a role model and exhibits the characteristics consistent with patient-centered care.”

Salzer’s 25-year connection to PBL was timely, as Education Day included a celebration of the silver anniversary of the curriculum. Hosokawa spearheaded MU’s switch in the early 1990s from a traditional lecture-based program — described at the time by a Liaison Committee on Medical Education evaluator as a “perfectly preserved 1960s curriculum” — to a system in which students collaboratively learn from real clinical cases. Hosokawa gave a presentation explaining how PBL began at the request of former dean Lester Bryant and how it became a model for other medical schools.

Here are the other 2018 Education Day faculty award winners.

  • Pre-clerkship Faculty Educator: Ghassan Hammoud, MD.
  • Clinical Educator: Lucas Buffaloe, MD.
  • Resident Teaching: Madihah Hepburn, MD.
  • Pre-clerkship Innovation: Integrative Anatomy team (Carol Ward, PhD; Richard Sherwood, PhD; Kevin Middleton, PhD; Casey Holliday, PhD; Kristina Aldridge, PhD; Laura Johnson, PhD; Allison Nesbitt, PhD; and Cheryl Hill, PhD).
  • Clerkship Innovation: Raghav Govindarajan, MD.
  • Course Director: Laura Morris, MD.
  • Citation of Merit: Integrative Anatomy team.

View the Education Day photo gallery here.