President's Desk: Jason Marker, MD, FAAFP

Thanks for checking in one more time for my final blog post of the year. It's been a great year for the Foundation and I think it sets us up well for exciting things in 2016. I've taken some time to review my prior posts and am continually amazed by the work that our excellent Board of Trustees has done and the commitment that our staff members have made to executing the vision of the Board with precision. Many thanks to them all.

Our Board meeting this last November tackled some big issues for us. If I had to sum up the meeting in a word it would be "governance". I have worked hard during my time with the Board (7 years!!) to do what I could to help us gain a more solid foundation. We have restructured as an organization, adjusted terms of service, rebuilt our officer track, and created opportunities for enhanced skill set diversity at the Board table.  

This last Board meeting we tackled the matter of racial and ethnic diversity in our discussions about our new board members. We officially launched our Diversity Work Group which, led by President-Elect Dr. Hughes Melton, will spend 2016 working on the necessary internal changes to integrate a focus on diversity into our organizational DNA. We also made needed changes to the governance of our research area that will lay the groundwork for the future success of the Research Signature Program being led by new President Dr. Evelyn Lewis&Clark.

Dr. Douglas Spotts from Pennsylvania was elected as our new Treasurer and will be a powerful addition to our officer track as Dr. Brent Smith moves on from Treasurer to Vice President. Our new Trustees elected for 3 year terms are:

Corporate Trustee: Carrie Johnson with CompHealth
Chapter Trustee: Dr. Gretchen Dickson
At-Large Trustee: Dr. David Govaker

I'd like to offer here a special thank you to our outgoing Board member, Mr. Stephen Gray Wallace, whose service to the Board was much appreciated!

Finally, I'd like to thank you, our faithful blog followers, for your ongoing support of the work of the AAFP Foundation. I have had an excellent time on the Foundation Board of Trustees. I have learned a lot, always felt supported and appreciated, and been blessed with opportunities I could never have had otherwise. It's been a great run and I will miss the Board, staff and the work that we have done together. My year ahead is an unknown, but I'm sure that I will find things to keep me busy. I will continue to be involved with the FMAHealth leadership team as well as activities in my own state Chapter. I also think I'll find ways to stay in touch with my friends at the Foundation - I'm "just a donor" now and that may be my greatest asset to the organization. If I'm lucky, I'll get asked to keep teaching in the Family Medicine Leads Emerging Leader Institute (wink, wink)!

Thanks for staying in touch in 2015 and plan to join us in 2016 for future installments of the AAFP Foundation Blog.

President's Desk: Jason Marker, MD, FAAFP

For me and my family in Indiana, the start of high school marching band season usually denotes the start of autumn, but with a late-September warm snap and plenty of green in the leaves still, it felt like summer as I headed off to Denver for the AAFP Congress of Delegates and the Family Medicine Experience (FMX). As I lay-over on my return trip in the Detroit airport I see that I am returning to autumn - 50 degrees, wind, a light rain, and somehow while I was away, trees in harvest shades. This year's annual "meeting of the minds" for our specialty has ushered in fall.

 How fitting, then, that our meeting in Denver marks the turning point in the cycle of the Foundation from summer planning and committee work to preparations for our fall Board meeting and start of a new year of Foundation leadership. I will use this blog to touch on a few key areas of interest: Signature Programs, Board diversity, and our status within the "family of Family Medicine."

SIGNATURE PROGRAMS
Our Humanitarian Signature Program, Family Medicine Cares, is flourishing. We continue to see momentum for the Foundation to support new and pre-existing free clinics and lots of student and resident interest in participating in these programs. Our projects in Haiti are overflowing with interest in all three sectors of patient care, humanitarian support, and medical education, and we are expanding in a more robust longitudinal faculty development project using both face-to-face and distance learning approaches. Dr. Don Briscoe, a residency program director in Houston is helping guide this process as a consultant to our planning team.

Family Medicine Leads (FML) - both the National Conference scholarship program and the FML Emerging Leader Institute - has created considerable buzz among the leadership of the Academy and among the students and residents themselves as they are already expressing interest in next year - 10 months away! Click here to watch our video highlighting the inaugural FML Emerging Leader Institute.

Dr. Evelyn Lewis&Clark is leading the charge in developing our Research Signature Program and has had a series of meetings through the summer to solidify the direction we will go. As we seek out Board of Trustee candidates for the coming year, those with research skills and interest will be highly sought out by our Board as this Signature Program may be the hardest one to develop of the three.

The Annual Donor Recognition Dinner was a great event celebrating these programs. Enjoy these photos from our evening at the Seawell Grand Ballroom at the Denver Performing Arts Center. 

DIVERSITY
The Board of Trustees has entirely re-envisioned what "board diversity" means following our excellent diversity education sessions at the spring board meeting. Our Diversity Enhancement Work Group has worked over the summer to prepare for changes we can make to affect this fall's selection process for 2016 Trustees and to set an agenda of work for 2016. We have reached out to our friends in the AAFP's NCCL (National Conference of Constituency Leaders) groups as well as other national organizations like the National Hispanic Medical Association to seek out the best and the brightest of diverse backgrounds AND strong Family Medicine skill sets.

During my address as Foundation President to the AAFP Congress of Delegates, I signaled our desire to enhance the diversity of our Board and we were immediately rewarded with several interested members seeking application materials. How the Foundation manages its diversity in the next couple of years promises to be the biggest game-changer we'll see for our donor pool and our programming effectiveness. Stay tuned. If you, or someone you know, can bring diversity to our board (racial and ethnic diversity, but also diversity from other underrepresented groups AND with diverse backgrounds in our three mission-driven areas of humanitarian work, education, and research) please reach out to Phyllis Naragon or Brenda Cherpitel to find out more.

THE FAMILY OF FAMILY MEDICINE
It has been my observation that historically, the Foundation has felt a little bit like it sat at the "kiddie table" during the Thanksgiving feast of the various family medicine organizations. As I approach the completion of my term as Foundation President, I have seen quite a change in our culture in this area. Our programming has expanded in depth and quality as we have focused on the development of our signature programs. Since the addition of Public Trustees (trustees from outside of the formal "house of medicine") our worldview has expanded and we've incorporated concepts from other industries. We are finding more and more interest in our activities from the leadership of other family medicine organizations and are feeling emboldened to take a look at other primary care organizations from whom we can partner for stronger mutual support. Finally, the Foundation has positioned its own leaders well within the organizational structure of FMAHealth - keeping our philanthropic principles well-attended to in their strategic planning processes.

Can it be long before a physician who has STARTED their leadership involvement in the Foundation is leveraging that experience for greater leadership on the Academy side of the equation? Which of the organizations in the family of family medicine couldn't be stronger with the leadership of those individuals whose organizational upbringing started with the Foundation? I see the day coming when the AAFP President will proudly be a Past President of our AAFP Foundation instead of the other way around.

Our VIP event at FMX sold out this year. It was a who's who of our donors including an ever-increasing number of family medicine leaders who are seeing our event as the "must-attend" event to finish off their week of meetings. Enjoy these photos from our evening of fine dining and enjoyment in the Boettcher Concert Hall with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra.


This last week in Denver has been a marvelous opportunity to network with our Foundation officers, staff, corporate partners, and trustees. Our Foundation truly is rising in strength, wisdom, and capacity to achieve the goals of our mission statement. I hope that each of you examines your own relationship with the Foundation and commits to strengthening that relationship in the coming years. Good things lie ahead and we want you to be a part of it! 

We Did It...

I wrote this in the Minneapolis airport on my way home from Kansas City following the AAFP's National Conference and our inaugural Family Medicine Leads Emerging Leader Institute. I'm reasonably sure that my body was  depleted of ALL adrenaline by the experience. Not only is NC an inherently high-energy event, but for me it included presentations with our President-Elect Evelyn Lewis&Clark on Family Medicine Cares (FMC), co-presenting with Dr. Yerba Castellos-Lopes on her project for the FMC Resident Service Award, time spent with our Foundation staff in our exhibit hall booth, and time staffing in the FMAHealth booth.

Rest assured that your Foundation was a visible, verbal, and notable presence at National Conference. We were recognized throughout the event both for our sponsorship of Family Medicine Leads Scholarships and by Main Stage speakers who commented spontaneously that giving to the Foundation and FamMedPAC was an "obligation" of leaders in the organization. DONATE TODAY!

2015 FML Emerging Leader Institute Scholars

We also kicked off our inaugural Family Medicine Leads (FML) Emerging Leader Institute. For those of you who may be less familiar with the FML Emerging Leader Institute, it is a major component of Family Medicine Leads, the new Education Signature Program of the Foundation. I was interviewed about the inner workings of the FML Emerging Leader Institute by family physician and blogger Dr. Beth Oller. Rather than repeat all of those details here, I'd refer you to her excellent blog post on the matter from August 12.

We started with a breakfast meeting on Thursday of National Conference, assembling the 30 students and residents to get them oriented, acquainted with one another (and with us) and to express to them the importance of their time in Kansas City. We took group pictures, handed out their certificates, and escorted them into the VIP seating for the opening Main Stage presentation. The theme of Thursday for the FML Emerging Leader Institute Scholars was about being mindful of your past and aware of your present as a pre-requisite for becoming the leader you want to be in the future. My breakfast remarks reflected on the traits in my own family tree that make me who I am as a leader and began to get them thinking about their own stories and plans for the future. 

On Saturday and Sunday we brought the scholars to the AAFP Foundation headquarters in Leawood for, I am convinced, the best leadership development conference around. We started with a welcome from Dr. Henley and a formal inaugural address from me. The address drew on inaugural messages from U.S. Presidents "re-worded" to put them in the context of the FML Emerging Leader Institute.

Neal Sharma & Dr. Jason Marker

From there, I should let the pictures do the talking. We learned together, laughed together, played games, had snacks, toured the headquarters, and ate dinner. Following our meal we had a presentation from Dr. Angee McDaniel from Pfizer about the importance of mending the relationship between industry and the house of medicine, and from Mr. Neal Sharma an influential KC business man who comes from a family of physicians.  Neal spoke about applying innovative entrepreneurial skills in healthcare. Sunday we spent the day preparing the scholars for the projects they will undertake in the months ahead, wished them well, packed them back on the coach bus, and sent them off to the airport.

I know this post can never reflect the rich and robust "feel" of our inaugural FML Emerging Leader Institute, but let me tell you that we (your AAFP Foundation leadership and staff) feel that something deeply important for the discipline of Family Medicine just happened, and we couldn't be happier that it started at the AAFP Foundation. I have a sense that I will look back some day and say, "I was there when..."