As many of you know, Dr. Alan Glass is officially “retiring” this month and moving to Palm Springs, California. Normally, this would be devastating news, but Alan has agreed to continue to work with us long distance at a reduced effort maintaining part-time roles as an Advisory Dean, helping with admissions, and supporting the clinical skills center through the CCX in the COVID era.
Dr. Glass has been a member of the Washington University Community since 2004, when he was named the Assistant Vice Chancellor for Students and Director of the Habif Health and Wellness Center. In this role, he became a nationally recognized expert in the evolving health and educational needs of college students, including substance use and abuse, mental health and LGBTQ health. During his time on the Danforth, he introduced online alcohol education, created the first sexual assault position (now morphed into the RSVP center), and added radiology and full pharmacy services to the Habif Health and Wellness Center, among other accomplishments. His work as a leader on the Danforth led to national recognition of the school’s health and wellness programming.
Despite a full plate developing the clinical care and programming for students on the Danforth campus, Dr. Glass was committed to engaging here on the Medical School Campus- teaching and participating in admissions. He was so effective in these roles, that in 2009, he was named the Clinical Skills Section Leader within the Practice of Medicine Course, and in 2017, he was named the Assistant Dean for Medical Student Admissions. Within Practice of Medicine, he has been highly effective as a teacher, resulting in Distinguished Service Teaching Awards each year in the last 10 years. In his admissions roles, he has actively developed and supported holistic review and the enhanced recruitment of diverse applicants. He has been a critical mentor for the student members of LGBTQ Med and worked with them to enhance recruitment and retention of LGBTQIA applicants.
In 2018, I was fortunate to have Alan come to the Medical School Campus full-time. He has been a godsend as an educational leader. He has taken over as the Medical Director of the Standardized Patient (SP) Program. In this role, he has advanced the training and standardization of the SPs. He has worked with individual course directors to enhance the clinical scenarios and programs within their courses. He has worked with students to develop disability-training curricula. He has enhanced the high stakes examination OSCE (the CCX) and created new remediation processes. In addition, he has worked with me to pilot resident professionalism remediation using SPs and high fidelity simulation. Most recently, Dr. Glass has stepped up to serve as the Advisory Dean for Cori Society. For his many accomplishments, he was inducted into both the Academy of Educators and Gold Humanism Honor Society.
Although Dr. Glass will formally retire this month, I have no doubt he will continue to be an active presence here at Washington University Medical School for years to come, even from afar. Please join me in thanking Dr. Glass for his many, many contributions and wish him all the best in his new endeavors. We will have a formal celebration of his retirement in 2022, as he plans to return to see many of his student mentees graduate.