by Christina Crowe

The Association of Pathology Chairs elected 20 of the most accomplished educators in the specialty of pathology and laboratory medicine as founders of the newly established Academy of Distinguished Pathology Educators at its annual conference held late this summer.  Peter Anderson, DVM, Ph.D., Professor, Molecular and Cellular Pathology, was selected as part of the inaugural class of Distinguished Pathology Educators. 

Members of the Academy will work closely and collaboratively with the education committees of the Association of Pathology Chairs and with the Residency Program Directors Section and Undergraduate Medical Educators Section to:

• Advance excellence in pathology pedagogy.
• Support scholarship and innovation in pathology education and training.
• Develop educational leaders to serve within their medical schools, as well as national organizations. 

Dr. Anderson has had a long and distinguished career as an educator at UAB, having taught pathology to every class of UAB medical students since 1986.

For these efforts, he has received numerous teaching accolades, including the Ellen Gregg Ingalls/UAB National Alumni Society Award for Lifetime Achievement in Teaching. Anderson also been active in many education pursuits both nationally and internationally. He was the first Heersink School of Medicine faculty member to be receive the Alpha Omega Alpha–AAMC Robert J. Glaser Distinguished Teaching Award. He was also awarded the Association of Pathology Chairs Distinguished Teaching Award in Undergraduate Medical Education and the Stanley Robbins Distinguished Educator Award by the American Society for Investigative Pathology. He has been active internationally, serving as a Senior Scholar in Medical Education by the Fulbright Foundation. With Fulbright support he led faculty development and curricular reform efforts in many countries of sub-Saharan Africa, as well as all the medical schools in Taiwan.  In addition, Anderson has spent over 20 years working with the US Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) and the National Board of Medical Examiners, and in 2022 he received the NBME Edithe J. Levit Distinguished Service Award.

Anderson and the other newly elected members of the Academy have begun creating bylaws for governance and to plan initial priorities and activities.  A full list of the new founding members is available on the Academy of Distinguished Pathology Educators’ website: https://www.apcprods.org/academy-of-distinguished-educators.

“I congratulate the members of the new Academy on their election and greatly appreciate their commitment to foster innovation in education and to support and inspire the next generation of pathology educators,” said APC President Dani Zander, M.D.  “This new academy is more than just an honorific society. This group will be active contributors, who will greatly advance APC’s educational mission.”

The Association of Pathology Chairs is a nonprofit society that serves as the voice of academic departments of Pathology in the United States and Canada. It provides leadership and advocacy for the discipline of Pathology, and enables academic departments to meet the demands of their three missions: medical education, research, and practice.