Associate Professor Michael Corman and four UFV students visited Montreal in August to present at the American Sociological Association (ASA) conference. Michael also serves as a faculty associate with UFV’s Centre for Education and Research on Aging. After working on a paper called Moving Upstream in Health Professions Education: Why Structural Competency? Why Now?, the group shared their findings in a roundtable with one of the field’s leading sociology scholars, Dr. Laura Hirshfield. 

Last year in Michael’s sociology class (SOC 399V: Medical Systems and Society) these students helped design and teach a workshop on structural competency for nursing students. As his co-authors, they got the opportunity to represent UFV at one of the world’s largest academic assemblies for sociologists. The team gave an award-winning presentation at UFV’s Student Research Day and hopes to publish their work in the Teaching Sociology journal next year.    

“Structural competency is a way of instilling the sociological imagination in health professions education. The sociological imagination is essentially about context, and how context shapes the everyday,” Michael explains.  

“Structural competence is all about moving upstream, looking at how context shapes the individual, their biology. There’s a huge need to give our health professionals tools to think about the world in nuanced and critical ways – as a society, we really need to think about how to create healthier individuals and healthier societies.” 

Jenna Kerr, Morgan King-Roskamp, Lisa Halliday and Caitlin Kemble are all passionate about the principles they learned in Michael’s class and enjoyed digging into them more through their workshop and paper.    

“Being able to apply the learning to something actionable felt empowering to me,” says Jenna. 

The group hopes that the subjects they’re studying will change the world for the better. According to their research, embracing upstream, structural solutions could mean less burnout for healthcare workers – and much smarter and effective healthcare spending.  

Michael was very proud to see his students present their work at the ASA. “They’re pros. Like, seriously, they’re all pros,” he beams.  

“That was my first time ever presenting, so I was super nervous,” Morgan shares. “But I think it went really well. Because we worked together so long, it flowed naturally. I feel like structural competency has become a part of me now, in a way where I just know it.” 

For Jenna, it was surreal to discuss the paper with Dr. Laura Hirshfield, one of the authors who shaped their work in the first place.  

The project was transformative for Morgan, who says taking SOC 399V was the best choice she’s ever made.  

“The most important takeaway for me was to do hard things. Do things that you’re afraid to do, that allow you to connect with other people. Presenting is often seen as a very intimidating thing, but this conference expanded my mind. It is a highly influential experience that I was lucky enough to take the course. I would encourage other students to just go for it.” 

This triumph at the ASA conference brings an exciting end to their long journey toward publication. Reflecting on their visit to Montreal, Jenna says, “It was cool working with everyone for such a long period of time and then going and presenting. As we’re wrapping up the article, it feels like a little celebration.”  

To learn more about sociology, and UFV’s entire School of Culture, Media and Society, visit https://www.ufv.ca/scms/.