The School of Medicine Office for Faculty Development created the ALICE program in 2016 as a leadership development opportunity for mid-career women faculty in the Duke School of Medicine. Each year, the program selects a new class of women to take part in the program, which provides in-depth skill development, personal reflection and goal setting, peer-mentoring, and constructive feedback.
The ALICE program, short for Academic Leadership, Innovation, and Collaborative Engagement, uses workshops, seminars, and a variety of trainings tailored specifically for its participants to receive leadership training and career expertise. Accepted into the program this year are Georgia Tomaras, PhD, Professor of Surgery, Division of Surgical Sciences, and Eileen Raynor, MD, Associate Professor of Surgery, Division of Head and Neck Surgery and Communication Sciences.
The program seeks to address an important underlying issue: The discrepancy between the numbers of men and women in senior leadership positions in academic medicine. By appealing to mid-career women faculty, ALICE strives to help its participants gain greater self-awareness, management abilities, and communication skills necessary to further their careers and navigate leadership roles in academic medicine.