Using fourth-year medical students as academic coaches

Coaching helps learners visualise their future, promotes a trusting environment, facilitates self-directed learning, assists with goal setting and fosters accountability. Some of the biggest barriers to coaching students effectively are learner engagement, scheduling, coach training and resources to support a coaching programme. We piloted a coaching programme that would address these challenges and also benefit the coaches in a meaningful way.

In summer of 2022, we recruited 10 senior medical students to be volunteer coaches for the 21 incoming medical students enrolled in our online 7-week prematriculation course (PMC), offered as an option to all matriculating medical students. All coaches were starting a master's degree or research project after their third year, which made them more available. We thought our PMC was an ideal environment to incorporate coaching because of its unique structure, as it covers several challenging biomedical science organ systems and uses team-based learning with weekly assessments and self-reflections. Also, starting medical school is a major transition for students, especially those who take our PMC who are more likely to be non-science majors or have taken several gap years.¹ Coaches were randomly assigned two or three students and met once per week. Since the coaches were students, they did not have access to their coachee's assessment data. The meetings were held weekly to facilitate building trust during a relatively short time-frame. The coaches were trained on coaching principles and philosophies such as appreciative inquiry and master adaptive learner. Coaches were encouraged to use publicly available American Medical Association (AMA) coaching resources, which included a book and video series depicting different types of coaching scenarios. There were also check-in meetings to share knowledge about coaching techniques and provide feedback.

The academic coaching component of the course received an overall student satisfaction score of 4.44/5. We also conducted a follow-up survey for PMC students 6 months into their first-year of medical school (N = 19). The coaching topics of study techniques/habits, navigation of personal/academic setbacks, identification and self-reflection on personal strengths/weaknesses, goal-setting and well-being/work–life balance were reported as the most helpful by students. Students commented that coaching was a good way to be introduced to trying different studying techniques. Most students agreed or strongly agreed that they would like to have continued coaching during their first-year of medical school with a frequency of once per month. Two students reported a negative experience because their coach focused on getting high test scores and generally did not connect. Students suggested that pairing coaches/coachees with similar backgrounds and life experiences would be more ideal. Several coaches and coachees have shown interest in being part of the training of the next cohort of coaches, offering opportunities for peer-to-peer knowledge sharing to improve the program. Coaches also benefited from the experience, reporting that their motivational interviewing and communication skills were positively impacted. Coaching programmes should consider using senior medical students as they represent a consistent pool of highly talented and motivated individuals who can form a unique connection with their coachees and also benefit from the experience.