Effective Use of Curriculum Design Methodology and Simulation to Improve Applicant Review in a Doctor of Medicine Admissions Program

Recruitment and admission of highly qualified applicants to Doctor of Medicine (MD) programs are vital components of many academic institutions. We aimed to develop a structured curriculum to facilitate consistent and mission-aligned review of applicants within our MD admissions program. Across the 2023–2024 admissions cycle, we utilized Kern’s Six-Step Approach to Curriculum Development to design and implement a simulation-based curriculum to enable mission-aligned applicant evaluation, beginning with the interview process. The training targeted faculty interviewers and admissions committee members responsible for reviewing a diverse applicant pool that includes many non-traditional candidates. Our training was completed by 32 interprofessional medical school faculty, of whom 28 submitted both pre- and post-training rubrics, and 24 completed a retrospective post-then-pre survey. On a 4-point Likert scale, comfort applying competency-based interviewing (CBI) within the mission-aligned review framework increased from 3.0 to 3.8 (p < 0.0001, 95% CI 0.44–0.97), and ease of use for the new rubric was rated 3.4 compared to 3.0 for the prior rubric (p = 0.0215). Concordance with ideal scoring improved from 68% to 73% (p = 0.0287), corresponding to a mean increase from 6.11 to 6.54 of 9 competencies correctly assessed. Identification of weak competencies increased from 14% to 27% (p = 0.0287). Faculty rated the overall quality of the training as 3.7/4 (SD 0.5). These findings, based on a small sample from a single institution, suggest that simulation-based faculty development may improve interviewer comfort, rubric usability, and the process measure of scoring consistency in a simulated MD admissions setting.