Reflections on the presentation: “The Poetry of Good Listening: Implications for Undergraduate Medical Education from Voices Across Academic Medicine”
“[We] combined the art of poetry with the science of listening to start student affairs professionals on the path to deeper listening and more meaningful engagement with the students they serve.”
In April 2022, Listener Poets Jenny Hegland and Yvette Perry presented at the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) national meeting of the Group on Student Affairs/ Careers in Medicine/ Organization of Student Representatives affinity group in Denver, Colorado. The presentation, “The Poetry of Good Listening: Implications for Undergraduate Medical Education from Voices Across Academic Medicine,” introduced attendees to the act of “listening like a poet.”
The presentation highlighted insights from The Good Listening Project’s partnership with AAMC (supported by a grant from the National Endowment of the Arts) in which we held Listener Poet sessions with over 250 members of the academic medicine community (e.g., medical students, physicians, faculty, staff).
Throughout the presentation Hegland and Perry shared several poems and stories of the conversations that inspired them, written following conversations with people across the academic medicine community. As an unexpected treat, one of the participants from the partnership agreed to read the poem written for her. Leonor Corsino MD, Duke University School of Medicine, read the poem from her session authored by Jenny, “Waymaking.”
Jenny, a Listener Poet since 2019 who also serves as the lead facilitator of TGLP’s Brave Conversations small group workshops, said was delighted to meet Dr. Corsino in person just prior to the presentation.
“As soon as she said the name of her poem, I remembered her story and the power of her poem, even though I wrote it more than a year ago,” said Jenny. “I’ve learned through our Brave Conversations that it’s very powerful to hear poemees read their poems in their own voices, and this felt like an amazing opportunity. So I asked her and she agreed!”
Yvette, a Listener Poet since 2021, is the associate dean for admissions at the College of Medicine and Life Sciences at The University of Toledo.
“It was so amazing to blend these two important areas of my professional life. I’ve been going to these conferences as part of the GSA for over a decade and this was the first time I experienced a session quite like this. Jenny and I successfully combined the art of poetry with the science of listening to start student affairs professionals on the path to deeper listening and more meaningful engagement with the students they serve. The feedback from the attendees—including several medical students—was overwhelmingly positive.”
The Group on Student Affairs (GSA) is one of several affinity groups within the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). The GSA addresses issues in medical school admissions, student affairs, student diversity affairs, student financial assistance, and student records for the 171 member medical schools across the USA and Canada.
More information on the TGLP partnership with the AAMC, along with sample poems from the engagement, can be found here. The conference description of the session can be found here.
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