RISE Community
RISE Michigan Experts focus group

HSEI at Michigan Medicine

Learn about our education innovation community and how you can join.
Education Innovation Community

Our community supports collaboration through shared ideas, resources and goals. This inclusive community represents learners, staff and faculty innovators across the Michigan Medicine continuum from different disciplines, organizations and expertise. This community implements ideas to address important educational problems, shares best practices, fosters professional development and ultimately drives innovation throughout all of health sciences education.

For additional questions, please contact [email protected].
RISE Leadership
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Rajesh Mangrulkar, MD, Executive Director
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Dr. Mangrulkar’s work lies in organizational leadership and innovative technologies, and their interface with transforming medical education at scale. As associate dean, he led the curriculum, student affairs, evaluation and assessment, educational research, learning community, and admissions units for medical student education at the University of Michigan.

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Paula Thompson, PhD, MA, Program Director
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Dr. Paula Thompson is the Michigan Medicine Research. Innovation. Scholarship. Education (RISE) program director. She oversees the RISE unit operations and innovation project development. Prior to this role, Dr. Thompson served as director, Advancing Scholarship at the University of Michigan Medical School where she led efforts to develop and disseminate the school’s education research and promote an infrastructure to produce high-quality scholarship.

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Nikki Bibler Zaidi, MEd, PhD, Evaluation and Assessment Director
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Dr. Nikki Bibler Zaidi is the evaluation and assessment director for Michigan Medicine Research. Innovation. Scholarship. Education (RISE). She oversees the RISE unit evaluation and assessment. Prior to this role, Dr. Zaidi served as associate director, Advancing Scholarship at the University of Michigan Medical School where she worked with Dr. Thompson to advance and disseminate the school’s education research and promote an infrastructure to produce high-quality scholarship.

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Meg Wolff, MD, MHPE, Curriculum Director
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Dr. Meg Wolff is the curriculum director of the Research. Innovation. Scholarship. Education (RISE) unit at Michigan Medicine. In this role, she provides oversight to the development and progress of our RISE innovators. Dr. Wolff also currently serves as the director of the medical student coaching program at University of Michigan Medical School. She has previously served in medical education leadership roles spanning UME and GME including as the emergency medicine medical education fellowship director and the associate program director of pediatrics residency. Prior to this, she served in medical education leadership roles spanning UME and GME including as the emergency medicine medical education fellowship director.
RISE Innovators

Learn more about the Innovators in the Innovator Development Program.

Courtney Burns, B.S.E., Medical Student
Courtney Burns is a medical student on a research year in the Department of Anesthesiology in between her third and fourth years at the University of Michigan Medical School. As a RISE Innovator, Ms. Burns will develop the use of community-engaged art to promote emotional resilience among anesthesiology trainees and faculty after challenging clinical events (e.g., patient deaths, cardiac or respiratory arrests, etc.).

Malak Elshafei, BA, Medical Student
Malak Elshafei is a second-year medical student at the University of Michigan Medical School. As a RISE Innovator, Ms. Elshafei plans to enhance the M1 curriculum by integrating EPIC training and simulating patient cases during the scientific trunk, fostering early application of medical knowledge and providing students with earlier clinical experience.

Kathrine Giarra, MD, Department of Emergency Medicine & Internal Medicine
Dr. Kathrine Giarra is a second-year critical care fellow in the Department of Emergency Medicine & Internal Medicine at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE Innovator, Dr. Giarra will develop a computer-based simulation platform that will enable resident and fellow physician learners to hone clinical reasoning skills through deliberate practice on simulated critically ill patient cases.

Rachel Gottlieb-Smith, MD, MHPE, Department of Pediatrics
Dr. Rachel Gottlieb-Smith is a clinical associate professor in the Department of Pediatrics at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE Innovator, Dr. Gottlieb-Smith will develop a system to more accurately and completely describe the clinical experiences and knowledge gaps of child neurology residents in real time, to allow for more timely precision education.

Jenna Greenberg, MD, Department of Family Medicine
Dr. Jenna Greenberg is a clinical assistant professor in family medicine and assistant residency director at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE Innovator, Dr. Greenberg will develop a novel feedback process with a focus on equitable assessment and mitigating bias to promote a culture of inclusion.

Katie Grzyb, MHSA, Department of Internal Medicine
Katie Grzyb is the continuous improvement specialist lead in the Department of Internal Medicine at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE Innovator, Ms. Grzyb will create resources for residents to make clear connections between Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) and Quality Improvement work.

Kayla Marcotte, MS, MD/PhD Student
Kayla Marcotte is an MD/PhD student in the Medical Scientist Training Program at the University of Michigan Medical School. As a RISE Innovator, Ms. Marcotte will develop and implement a faculty dashboard that displays quality metrics for narrative feedback given to medical trainees.

Alana Otto, MD, M.P.H., Division of Adolescent Medicine
Dr. Alana Otto is a clinical assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Michigan Medical School. As a RISE Innovator, Dr. Otto will evaluate and optimize a novel longitudinal cross-institutional learning collaborative for Adolescent Medicine fellows.
Previous Cohorts

Michael Brenner, MD, Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery
Dr. Michael Brenner is an associate professor of otolaryngology—head and neck surgery at University of Michigan Medical School, Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Brenner will address fragmented healthcare by integrating learning and patient care across medical, dental, nursing, social work and pharmacy health professions.

Heather Burrows, MD, Department of Pediatrics
Dr. Heather Burrows is a clinical professor of pediatrics and serves as the associate chair of education in pediatrics as well as the pediatrics residency program director at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Burrows will create and implement a leadership curriculum for the graduate medical education community.

Ivan Co, MD, Departments of Emergency Medicine and Internal Medicine, Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care
Dr. Ivan Co is a clinical assistant professor in emergency medicine and internal medicine, critical care. He serves as the assistant program director of the Emergency Medicine Critical Care Fellowship at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Co will continue creating MI-DIVA (Michigan- Difficult IntraVenous Access Model). This model will allow trainees to practice challenging central venous catheter placement in a simulated environment through a deliberate practice model.

Melanie Donahue, MD, Internal Medicine-Pediatrics Residency Program
Dr. Melanie Donahue is a fourth-year med-peds resident at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Donahue will develop a novel curriculum for internal medicine and pediatric physicians to facilitate patients transitioning from pediatric to adult providers.

Chelsea Fisk, BS, Department of Cardiac Surgery
Ms. Chelsea Fisk is a clinical researcher in cardiothoracic surgery at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, Ms. Fisk will develop The Health Equity Literature Archive (HELA), an employee-centered initiative to foster independent, self-paced learning about the social determinants of health through memoirs, literary fiction and other works.

Glenn Fox, PhD, Anatomical Sciences
Dr. Glenn Fox is the director of the Anatomical Donations Program and co-directs the first year (M1) medical anatomy course at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, he will develop and integrate eXtended Reality learning experiences into M1 gross anatomy sessions.

Alton R. Johnson Jr., DPM, Department of Orthopaedic Surgery
Dr. Alton R. Johnson Jr. is a clinical assistant professor, podiatrist, podiatric surgeon and wound care specialist in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the University of Michigan Medical School. As a RISE innovator, he will develop and implement scalable utilization of augmented reality to enhance medical training education and patient care experiences.

Elissa Patterson, PhD, Departments of Psychiatry and Neurology
Dr. Elissa Patterson is a clinical assistant professor of psychiatry and neurology at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Patterson will develop a curriculum focused on interprofessional core competencies of pain management.

Vitaliy Popov, PhD, Department of Learning Health Sciences
Dr. Vitaliy Popov is an assistant professor in the University of Michigan Medical School Department of Learning Health Sciences with a courtesy appointment at the School of Information. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Popov will implement a validated radar graphical tool mapping the four constructs of shared decision-making (SDM) to provide real-time visualization of care provider/team and patient/family perspectives on a given SDM situation.

Andrew Wong, MD, Department of Internal Medicine Residency Program
Dr. Andrew Wong is a third-year internal medicine resident at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Wong will develop a novel curriculum (DATA-MD) to teach and empower healthcare professionals to use and appraise machine learning decision tools in the clinical setting.

Sandra Hearn, MD, Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation
Dr. Sandra Hearn is the interim associate chair of education and professional development in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation.  As a RISE innovator, Dr. Hearn reshaped the feedback culture using a virtual landscape.

Hyeon Joo, MS, M.H.I., Software Engineer at META
Mr. Hyeon Joo is a software engineer at META.  As a RISE innovator, Mr. Joo developed an evidence-based machine learning tool to improve the care of heart failure patients by integrating its use with practitioners and learners.

Andrew Krumm, PhD, Department of Learning Health Sciences
Dr. Andrew Krumm is an assistant professor of learning health sciences at the University of Michigan Medical School.  As a RISE innovator, Dr. Krumm devised targeted assessment-feedback encounters to improve general surgeons’ operative performance.

Margaret (Meg) Wolff, MD, MHPE, Department of Emergency Medicine
Dr. Meg Wolff is a professor of emergency medicine and pediatrics at the University of Michigan Medical School. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Wolff developed innovators’ master adaptive learner skills through a comprehensive coaching program.

John Burkhardt, MD, PhD, Departments of Emergency Medicine and Learning Health Sciences
Dr. John Burkhardt is an assistant professor in the Departments of Emergency Medicine and Learning Health Sciences. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Burkhardt engaged residents to use their individual clinical practice data to stimulate critical reflection on unconscious bias in health care practices.

Emily Johnson, MD, M.Sc, General Surgery Resident at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus
Dr. Emily Johnson is a general surgery resident at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. As a RISE innovator, Dr. Johnson worked to address a key health issue in society by developing a curriculum for future health care providers at the intersection of health, clinical practice, sustainability and climate change.

Jenni Lane, MA, Assistant Director, Training and Technical Assistance at Weitzman Institute
Ms. Jenni Lane is the assistant director, training and technical assistance at Weitzman Institute.  As a RISE Mini-Grant Recipient, Ms. Lane developed an educational model that translates research intro practice to improve provider practices for delivering confidential risk screening to adolescent patients. Learn more about her project

Marcus Sherman, BS, The Roux Institute at Northeastern University
Mr. Marcus Sherman is an assistant teaching professor of bioinformatics at Northeastern University. His project aimed to improve scientific knowledge for all biomedical science graduate student instructors (GSIs) through a novel curriculum (POISE), combining traditional classroom education with community outreach.

Shoba Subramanian, PhD, Principal Program Manager, University Partnerships at Amazon
Dr. Shoba Subramanian is the principal program manager, university partnerships at Amazon.  As a RISE innovator, Dr. Subramanian developed competencies and a competency-based intervention to facilitate creativity and problem-solving in early biomedical sciences graduate students.

Marty Tam, MD, Department of Internal Medicine, Cardiology
Dr. Tam is the internal medicine program director at Michigan Medicine. As a RISE innovator, he developed a time-variable model of education for late residency and early cardiology fellowship using entrustable professional activities (EPA) in practice.
#IAMANINNOVATOR VIDEO SERIES

This video series provides a platform for education innovators to share their innovative ideas and discoveries. It also provides a unique opportunity for our innovation community to learn about education innovations happening within Michigan Medicine. We hope you are inspired by these innovation stories, and we invite you to reach out to these innovators to learn more about their work. 

Speakers in the series include:

Our video series was highlighted in MHealth Lab.
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Previous RISE newsletters
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Points of Blue
Sarah Hartley, MD, MHPE: Collaborating with the medical education community
Sarah Hartley, MD, MHPE, is a clinical professor of internal medicine and associate residency program director at the University of Michigan Medical School.
 Vitaliy Popov
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Improving shared decision-making among interprofessional teams
A new teaching tool, Radar, is helping teams improve their shared decision-making skills in educational and patient settings. Innovator Vitaliy Popov is receiving funding and support through the RISE Innovation Development Program. The project was originally funded through the Center for Interprofessional Education.
 Chelsea Fisk sitting on a bench outside
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Health Equity Literature Archive brings access to diverse literature to the Frankel Cardiovascular Center (FCVC) for Michigan Medicine employees
Known as the Health Equity Literature Archive, Chelsea Fisk’s goal was to cultivate empathy and understanding for people from different backgrounds and diverse identities by providing employees with access to diverse literature. The innovative pilot led by clinical researcher Chelsea Fisk served as a form of DEI education that was free to use, self-paced and barrier-free.