Sylk Sotto is a bioethicist.

How kindness in disguise is holding women back in academic medicine

Conditions
June 1, 2025

Sexism in the workplace is often associated with overt hostility, harassment, insults, discrimination, or intimidation. But what about the subtler, seemingly well-intentioned behaviors that can still hinder women’s advancement? Our study explores benevolent sexism (BvS) in academic medicine and how it may quietly limit women’s careers, even in environments committed to gender equity.

What is benevolent sexism?

Coined by Glick and Fiske in 1996, benevolent sexism refers to attitudes that appear …

Read more…

How kindness in disguise is holding women back in academic medicine

Does silence as a faculty retention strategy in academic medicine and health sciences work?

Conditions
May 17, 2025

Faculty retention remains an ongoing concern for colleges and universities, especially at a time when there is a clear misalignment between the socio-political environment, the mission of higher education, and the values held by most faculty. If you’ve been paying attention, you know: higher education is experiencing waves of faculty disengagement.

However, some institutions respond to crises not with dialogue, but with silence. They avoid confronting faculty concerns …

Read more…

Does silence as a faculty retention strategy in academic medicine and health sciences work?

The misrepresentation of the EDUCATE Act and the future of our health care system

Education
June 27, 2024

In the past year alone, legislative assaults on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in higher education have surged across the United States. This disturbing trend threatens the foundational values of our academic institutions and endangers the very essence of health equity in medical education and practice.

The recent introduction of the Embracing Anti-Discrimination, Unbiased Curriculum, and Advancing Truth in Education (EDUCATE) Act by Rep. Greg Murphy, MD, and its 35 …

Read more…

The misrepresentation of the EDUCATE Act and the future of our health care system

What is anti-racist medical education?

Education
September 12, 2020

The current socio-political environment in the U.S. and worldwide has brought much-needed attention and heightened awareness to the plights of minoritized groups, especially Black and African-American communities.

Police brutality, structural violence, overt racism, and discrimination are only a few examples prompting new activism. Along with the COVID-19 pandemic, they have amplified health inequities and disparities that have pervasively been threatening communities of color.

As a response, academic medicine leaders, equity scholars, and …

Read more…

What is anti-racist medical education?