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Welcome to the Faculty Factory! In this first ever episode, we introduce you to our host Dr. Kimberly A. Skarupski and the mission of the Faculty Factory.
Dr. Skarupski is the Associate Dean for Faculty Development in the Office of Faculty Development at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
My name is Casey Callanan, and I’m darn proud to be a part of this exciting project. Kim has been a great friend and professional mentor of mine over the years. The idea of launching this podcast, website and community began well over a year ago when Kim and I worked together to publish her first book, WAG Your Work.
Kim’s vision for this project is exciting. I knew I needed to jump at the chance to work with her again. I have a background in editing and launching podcasts, and I’m the author of How to Podcast When You Aren’t Tech Savvy: A Clear-Cut Book about How (and Why) to Launch a Podcast.
Besides running this blog, my role at the Faculty Factory will be mostly behind the scenes. This includes helping Kim on the technical side of things with her website and podcast, but enough about me… let’s get back to the Factory!
In the first ever episode of the podcast, Kim explains her vision as to why she launched the Faculty Factory. You can learn more by reading the podcast’s entire transcript, or by listening to it via the embedded podcast player above.
Make sure to subscribe to the Faculty Factory podcast through Apple Podcasts/iTunes or wherever you get your favorite podcasts. We’d love to hear from you, contact us directly with feedback and/or Tweet me at @CaseyTalksLife. Maybe you want to be interviewed or perhaps you have an idea for Kim to cover on the podcast? Please send us an email at FacultyFactoryKim@gmail.com.
Transcript – Welcome to the Faculty Factory (Podcast Episode No. 1)
Welcome to the first episode of the Faculty Factory podcast. I’m Kimberly Skarupski, the Associate Dean for Faculty Development in the Office of Faculty Development at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. The mission of the Faculty Factory is to build and support a community of leaders in faculty development who share tools, resources, wisdom and encouragement in service to our faculty members, schools and institutions. The vision is that the Faculty Factory will be a central hub for leaders in faculty development.
How did the Faculty Factory Originate?
How did this come about? It came about from my almost 12 years doing faculty development and attending the Association of American Medical Colleges Group on Faculty Affairs annual Professional Development Conference. And listening to all my friends in the field talk about their issues, their concerns, what they wanted to do. The Annual Professional Development Conference is a great opportunity for us to get together, we share our research and our projects with posters and podium presentations. And we have lots of opportunities for networking. But oftentimes isn’t quite enough for us to share our ideas, our challenges, what’s going on in our lives of faculty development. And I thought a podcast might be something fresh and real time where we can share some new innovative things, things that keep us awake at night and provide opportunities for us to get to know each other a little bit better.
Kim’s Faculty Development Background
I’ve been in faculty development for about a dozen years now. I fell into faculty development backwards. I started off as a sociologist gerontologist doing research and when NIH funding dried up my then boss at Rush University Medical Center, at the Rush Institute for Healthy Aging, offered me an opportunity to direct a brand new research and teaching mentoring program by Dr. Ali Keshavarzian, in internal medicine and gastroenterology.
I thought I’d do it for a while, giving about 50% effort, until I got a grant. That 50% effort morphed into 60%, 70%, 80%, 90% and those 23 original mentees grew to over 100. The key for me was, not only was I good at building and running this new program, but I really loved it.
That’s where I actually discovered faculty development and academic affairs. Up until that point I never had any interest or thoughts about doing anything in administration. I really found a nice niche and I certainly found a nice family with the Group on Faculty Affairs.
I was doing faculty development at Rush University for about six years when I found an opportunity at Johns Hopkins. I looked at those bullet points in the job description and realized that I was actually doing all that stuff already. I came to Hopkins in 2013.
My whole goal is just to try to bring us together, to build community. As a social scientist and gerontologist my area of interest has always been building community and small groups of people. I think this podcast and website will be a good way for us to build and grow our community and dig a little bit deeper into issues that are important all of us.
The Power of Podcasting
So why a podcast? To me I mean, I’m a Luddite, I’m old school, I really don’t know much about technology but I definitely recognized the value in podcasts. Bringing information and conversations that are new and current and allow us to talk about things in real time, and maybe dig a little bit deeper into some conversations that we just simply don’t have enough time for when we go to our annual conferences. You know, once a year or a couple times a year where we may run into each other might not be enough. There’s just so much, there are over 600 of us in the group on faculty affairs. And I just think that there’s a definite need and a yearning for closer connection but also sharing so much. We’re also unique we all do such wonderful things and there’s just never seems to be enough time to dig into some of these issues.
So I was hoping a podcast might be a nice way for us just to have an informal conversation and just get to know each other better and maybe discover some new things. And then some people might reach out to each other and build up some new collaborations. Start some new projects and really kind of maybe be inspired to do some things and share some ideas across institutions.
The Perfect Medium for Busy Professionals
So the other thing about a podcast is, of course, you know, the ease and the efficiency for being able to spend time there. You know, you can put the podcast on while you’re on the treadmill, when you’re on the elliptical, while you’re driving home at night or if you just want to snag a few minutes to hear some conversation. It’s really convenient way to find out what’s going on in current time without having to go sit through a webinar or look through a PowerPoint presentation. We thought it would be a nice way to just catalog some conversations that can be accessed really easily at any time and place.
So the other great thing about a podcast is that it allows us to kind of be a fly on the wall listening to some really interesting conversations. As we all know at our Annual Meetings they’re just…we’re always seem to be pressed for time running to the next event. Or there’s dinners and there are ceremonies and presentations and we always seem to be watching our clocks. And I think a podcast will be a really nice way for us to sit back, kick back and tune in.
Thanks for tuning in to Faculty Factory podcast, we will see you next time.