Health professions educators often face setbacks—classroom sessions that fall flat, feedback that stings, change that overwhelms, or innovations that don’t land as expected. Yet within these moments lie powerful opportunities for reflection, emotional growth, and meaningful transformation. This focus session reframes failure not as something to fear or fix, but as a springboard for learning, connection, and professional flourishing.

Grounded in principles of Appreciative Inquiry, emotional regulation, and growth mindset, the session offers a structured and psychologically safe environment where participants can share, process, and reframe their own educational challenges. Rather than problem-solving from a deficit perspective, we will explore how setbacks—when embraced with curiosity and vulnerability—can unlock new approaches to teaching, mentoring, and leadership.

Learning Outcomes

1. Reflect critically on personal or institutional educational setbacks.
2. Apply reframing strategies to extract learning from challenges.
3. Practice giving and receiving constructive dialogue around failure.
4. Identify systems-level strategies to normalize and support growth through failure.
5. Develop a personal “Growth Through Setback” plan to apply in their own context.