Our Mission

The Anti-Racism Coalition (ARC) student group presented data to deans, senior associate deans, administrators, and hospital staff, revealing a complex web of inequities in the medical school environment. The findings highlighted systemic issues including lack of diversity, inadequate inclusion and support for underrepresented students, superficial and harmful use of race in the curriculum, educators’ lack of preparedness to teach about race, and slow responses to contemporary racial issues.

In response to student advocacy, leadership undertook various initiatives to tackle racism and bias in curricula, student affairs, admissions, and other areas. Details of these efforts are in a comprehensive review available here. During this time, medical education leaders developed a vision for transformational change, created an innovative change management strategy, and participated in retreats and training to build their capacity for driving significant organizational change.

The Dept. of Medical Education formally launched the change management strategy with the vision to become a health system and educational institution with the most diverse workforce, delivering healthcare and education free of racism and bias. This strategy emphasized transformational change by altering the system across six key areas: student affairs, curricular affairs, admissions, student resources, clinical training, and the overall student experience.

Transformational change demands ongoing commitment beyond the short term. During this phase, medical education worked to create a change-friendly environment by instilling urgency to progress from the current state to the desired future. This process involved addressing root causes, building capacity while managing immediate challenges, fully committing to and embodying the change, continuously learning and refining strategies with feedback, and establishing a proactive group of leaders to set goals, explore implementation options, and effectively allocate resources (the guiding coalition).

During this phase, the Medical Education guiding coalition identified goals or change targets, developed a tactical plan for each sphere, communicated more broadly across the school and empowered broad-based action by building awareness of the change that was coming.

In this phase, the Medical Education guiding coalition began to embed and sustain the change by actively seeking information and feedback, learning from both successes and setbacks, and using those insights for necessary adjustments. This approach is not a rigid or formulaic process but focuses on accelerating success through increased agility and effective operation amid uncertainty.

The Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation funded a three-year Anti-Racist Transformation in Medical Education (ART in Med Ed) program to replicate the Icahn School of Medicine and Mount Sinai’s strategy at 11 partner medical schools in the U.S. and Canada. The program aims to develop the capacity of these institutions to dismantle systemic racism and bias within their institutions, and to foster shared learning on anti-racist practices across medical schools.

The Center for Anti-racism in Practice (CAP) was created in 2021 in an effort to integrate anti-racism efforts across the Medical School and the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

Driven by student advocacy and the dedication of the Graduate School community, the Racism & Bias Initiative was launched in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences (gRBI). This initiative, guided by the change management strategy, seeks to drive transformative change in graduate research and education, aiming to build a more inclusive and equitable environment for research and learning.

During this phase, members of the Graduate School community were invited to attend a series of data walks to rotate through “stations” to collectively make sense of the data, uncover areas of focus (short-term and long-term goals), and propose solutions to address racism and bias in the work and learning environments.

During this phase, key stakeholders and leadership were introduced to the change management strategy and worked to co-develop plans.

During this phase, we built a sense of urgency for transitioning from the current to the desired future state, committed deeply to the change process, and continuously practiced, learned, and gathered feedback from those impacted by the change. Representing various functional areas of the school, the GSBS guiding coalition was formed to oversee the change strategy, develop and communicate the vision, and guide the process throughout the Graduate School.

The GSBS guiding coalition developed change targets, created tactical plans, and established frameworks for monitoring outcomes and performance over time. The coalition also fostered widespread action by raising awareness, achieving short-term wins, and maintaining clear and consistent communication.

The GSBS guiding coalition began to embed and sustain change by actively seeking information and feedback, learning from successes and setbacks, and making necessary adjustments. This approach, similar to medical education, is flexible and adaptive, focusing on accelerating success by enhancing the ability to navigate and thrive amidst uncertainty.

In September 2023, the Institute for Equity and Justice in Health Sciences Education was established to expand upon Icahn Mount Sinai’s efforts to be an anti-racist, anti-biased learning and training environment in medical and graduate education. As part of this new initiative, the CAP portfolio and staff were formally integrated into the Institute.