Jaime Symowicz, PhD

Graduation Year: 2007
Advisor: Stack, Sharon
Current Position: Director of Educational Strategy and Content , Med IQ

Jaime Symowicz grew up in West Chicago, IL, a suburb about 30 miles west of downtown Chicago. She moved to Wisconsin to attend the University of Wisconsin-Madison, earning a BS in genetics. In 2001, Jaime joined the DGP, where she worked with Sharon Stack in the Department of Cell and Molecular Biology. She is currently the Director of Educational Strategy and Content at Med-IQ.

What made you want to go to graduate school?

When I started my undergraduate studies, I was initially interested in pursuing a career in genetic counseling. However, I became more interested in lab research when I was enrolled in the biology honors program (Biocore) at UW-Madison, which emphasized research, writing, problem-solving, and critical thinking. After working in the lab of one of the Biocore professors and doing my senior honors research project there on prolactin signaling in breast cancer progression, I knew I wanted to continue doing lab research and getting a PhD was the next step.

What brought you to Northwestern and the IGP/DGP?

I came to Northwestern for 2 main reasons: 1) the cancer biology track offered in the IGP and 2) the Chicago location. After working on a breast cancer research project as an undergrad, I wanted to focus on cancer biology for my PhD research. Prior to starting graduate school, I had also worked at Northwestern as lab tech for 2 years. I had interviewed at other schools, but I was already familiar with some of the IGP professors and their research and knew which labs I was interested in joining at Northwestern. Additionally, I wanted to stay in Chicago to experience city living after growing up in the western suburbs and commuting for my lab tech job.

What did you study in graduate school?

I worked in the lab of Dr. Sharon Stack in the Cell and Molecular Biology Department. My thesis project focused on how integrin signaling affected both E-cadherin and matrix metalloproteinase-9 to influence cell adhesion and cell invasion, respectively, and how these cellular mechanisms contributed to ovarian cancer metastasis.

Did you do a postdoc? What did you study?

No, I interviewed for postdocs, but did not find the right fit. Coincidentally around the same time I was interviewing for postdocs and finishing my PhD, a friend told me about an available position at the medical education company where she worked.

What was your first job outside of academic research, and how did you get it?

After finishing my PhD, I started working as a clinical communications specialist at a medical education company based in Chicago and New Jersey that provided continuing medical education (CME) programs for healthcare providers. A friend was already working there in a similar position and recommended that I apply for an open position. My responsibilities included writing needs assessments for independent medical educational grants that were submitted to pharmaceutical companies to support CME programs for healthcare providers. In these needs assessments, I identified practice gaps and educational needs for healthcare providers in specific disease states or therapeutic areas and then recommended educational formats and content to address them in non-biased, fair-balanced educational programs. Once the independent medical educational grants were awarded, I worked with faculty experts to put together the program content, which mostly consisted of slide presentations, case-based programs, or text materials.

What is your current position? Please describe the big picture of your position as well as a bit about the day-to-day.

I currently work remotely as the Director of Educational Strategy and Content at Med-IQ, a medical education company based in Baltimore that provides accredited clinical and risk management continuing education. In addition to comanaging the clinical content team, my day-to-day still involves serving as a clinical and scientific expert by preparing needs assessments and recommending educational strategies for independent medical education grants and then working with expert faculty to develop program content when grants are awarded to implement continuing education programs. About half of the time, I work in disease states and therapeutic areas that I am already familiar with, so I just need to stay up to date with new guidelines and treatments. Other times, I need to work in disease states and therapeutic areas that I know very little about, so I need to quickly educate myself about the standard of care and treatment landscape before starting a needs assessment. In my current position, I have proposed and implemented mostly online educational formats, including webcasts and case-based activities, but educational formats are continuously evolving. I have had the opportunity to help design and develop content for whiteboard-style animation educational videos and social media-based education, including Instagram-based programs for patients and Twitter-based programs for healthcare providers. I also do a decent amount of presenting, including sharing outcomes results to demonstrate the effectiveness of our educational programs, proposing new educational program concepts, and showcasing past educational programs in poster presentations at conferences, such as IDWeek and DDW.

How did Northwestern prepare you for your current career?

Several experiences at Northwestern helped me develop the following skills I now use in my career in medical education.

My presentation and communication skills: As a graduate student and lab tech, I was always encouraged to present at lab meetings, journal clubs, department seminars, and poster sessions. I gave several department presentations and poster presentations as a graduate student where I needed to explain the reason for my research and the rationale for my experimental design, which is very similar to what I do now in grant proposals with my need assessments and rationale for educational format and content
My ability to collaborate with colleagues: my research projects at Northwestern involved collaboration with other labs at and outside of Northwestern. At my current position, I work with several different colleagues every day, including grants directors, project managers, editors, and production specialists, in addition to faculty experts and collaborators at external organizations and institutions
My ability to develop educational content: My experiences at Northwestern serving as a teaching assistant for the cell biology course and helping new students in the lab gave me perspective on the level of detail and explanation I needed to provide to others, which I now use when developing content for continuing education programs for healthcare providers and patients
My time management skills: As a graduate student, I needed to juggle my thesis project, lab side projects, class work, presentation preparation, etc. to get everything done each day. In my current position, I need to split my time spent in meetings, managing my team, and working on content development for programs and needs assessments for grants. Timelines can be short and work may need to be reprioritized or delegated to meet all deadlines. I also have 2 school age children and my time management skills help me keep a good work-life balance.

What other experiences brought you to your current position?

I stayed at the same company (Spire Learning) where I landed after finishing my PhD for 10 years and moved up from a clinical communications specialist to the Group Director of Clinical Services during that time. I moved to Med-IQ because it was a larger company that provided continuing education in a broader range of educational formats, therapeutic areas, and disease states, some of which I did not have experience working in. I started there as a Manager of Educational Strategy and Content and then moved to my current Director position about 1 year ago.

What advice would you give to current students interested in pursuing a career similar to yours?

My career started when I was not expecting it, so I really cannot recommend a specific path to take to get here. However, there is a professional group (the Alliance for Continuing Education in the Health Professions) where you can learn more about the continuing education field if interested. In addition to the skills I mentioned above, I would recommend networking and staying in touch with classmates and lab colleagues because you never know when someone might reach out about a possible position that would be a good fit for you or when you might be able to do the same for them.

Do you have any final advice for graduate students?

Keep an open mind about where you might end up in your career and do not be afraid to take a different path if it is right for you.