Gender equity in health sciences education continues to face structural barriers. Women faculty advance more slowly through promotion and tenure, experience persistent salary inequities, and remain underrepresented in senior leadership positions. These gaps are reinforced by how academic work is valued. Teaching, mentoring, and service, which are disproportionately carried out by women, are often undervalued in promotion and compensation systems. Additionally, inconsistent policies for parental and caregiving leave create further obstacles, limiting career progression. These inequities persist within a shifting political climate that places added pressures on institutional commitments to equity, underscoring the urgency of addressing them to prevent stalled careers, loss of leadership potential, and attrition, and to ensure that faculty and learners can flourish in their academic careers.

This Focus Session will provide participants with an interactive forum to examine these challenges and develop strategies for sustaining and advancing gender equity in academic medicine and the health sciences. The session will begin with a 15-minute overview of current data and institutional examples, such as salary audits, promotion delays linked to service obligations, and reductions in caregiving support.

Participants will then engage in 40 minutes of small group case discussion. The session will reconvene for a 20-minute large group discussion, followed by a 15-minute synthesis of actionable strategies to promote flourishing and equity across institutions.

By the end of the session, participants will be able to identify structural barriers to gender equity in promotion, compensation, leadership, and caregiving support, analyze case examples to uncover institutional vulnerabilities and protective factors, propose adaptable strategies to advance gender equity in academic medicine and health sciences education, and build networks of peers to sustain ongoing institutional change.

Learning Outcomes

1. Identify and describe the most persistent barriers to gender equity in academic medicine, with attention to promotion and tenure, salary, leadership opportunities, and caregiving support.
2. Analyze case-based examples that illustrate how inequities emerge within institutional structures, and compare approaches that different institutions have taken to address them.
3. Generate and propose strategies that can be adapted across institutional settings to promote gender equity, even in climates where external political or financial pressures challenge equity-related initiatives.
4. Synthesize collective insights into a concise set of actionable strategies that can guide institutions in protecting and advancing equity.
5. Develop professional connections with peers who share an interest in gender equity and institutional change, strengthening the broader network of educators committed to equity in health sciences.

These outcomes emphasize not only recognition of problems but also the development of transferable solutions and the building of collaborative professional networks. Participants will leave with both practical tools and strengthened connections to sustain gender equity efforts within their own institutions.