Joyce Nyhof-Young BSc MSc PhD

Biography

Dr. Joyce Nyhof-Young is a professor and education scientist in the Department of Family and Community Medicine and the MD Program’s Office of Assessment and Evaluation. She is passionate about teaching, mentoring, and advising trainees and faculty in education research and scholarship. As an education scientist, she has focused her career on building capacity in education scholarship within the Faculty of Medicine and beyond. She does so using diverse strategies such as formal classroom teaching in MD Program lectures and small group tutorials, educational consultations, research mentorship, and project supervision. Her diverse, interdisciplinary teams of learners, practitioners and community members have built many novel and improved educational programs, curriculums, and resources in the MD Program, and in her home departments, hospital clinics, and local communities.

Quote from the Winner

Saint Augustine, a North African theologian and philosopher wrote, “Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are.” As healthcare providers and educators, we all have individual and collective decisions to make about how to maintain hope and commit to action in the face of the violence experienced by people like George Floyd, Joyce Echaquan, and Danielle Stephanie Warriner. My hope for a more just future is anchored in the amazing medical students I mentor. Education scholarship with my faculty and trainee colleagues provides me with the tools to teach trainees, improve the equity of our curriculum, and advocate for the diverse communities we serve.

About the Award

The Miriam Rossi Award for Health Equity in Undergraduate Medical Education aims to recognize University of Toronto MD Program faculty members for their commitment to diversity and health equity in undergraduate medical education. The award is named after Dr. Miriam Rossi, a pediatrician, teaching faculty, and former Associate Dean of Student Affairs in the Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, and a strong advocate and mentor for minorities. It was established in 2017 in recognition of Dr. Rossi’s outstanding contributions to health equity in medical education. Dr. Rossi led several initiatives to improve diversity in the U of T medical school, in particular the creation of the Summer Mentorship Program (SMP), established to encourage young Black and Aboriginal students, who are under-represented in medicine, to pursue careers in the health sciences. Like many of her contributions, the SMP was developed to help improve equity in the field of medicine, healthcare and society as a whole.