Scholars Program

Michael S. Ryan, MD, MEHP is Director of the Center for Excellence in Education, Professor of Pediatrics, and Associate Dean for Assessment, Evaluation, Research, and Scholarly Innovation at UVA. In addition to his education roles, Dr. Ryan attends on the pediatric hospitalist service for UVA Children’s Hospital. He is board certified in general pediatrics and pediatric hospital medicine.

Dr. Ryan was born in Chicago, grew up in northern New Jersey, and received his BS from Virginia Tech. He then moved back to Chicago where he received his MD from Loyola University Chicago – Stritch SOM and completed pediatrics residency at the University of Chicago. After completing residency in 2009, he joined the faculty at VCU serving as the first member of the pediatric hospital medicine program. He completed additional training in medical education, including the Stanford Clinical Educator program, the AAMC MERC program, and then a Master of Education in Health Professions (MEHP) from Johns Hopkins in 2015. He rose through the ranks at VCU and was promoted to full professor with tenure in 2021. During his 13-year career at VCU, Dr. Ryan served in several educational leadership positions including Pediatrics Clerkship Director, Associate Program Director, Assistant Dean for Clinical Medical Education, and Vice Chair of Education. He received local awards for teaching excellence throughout the continuum of medical education (pre-clinical, clerkship, and residency) and was recognized with the school-wide educational innovation/research award in 2016.

At the national level, Dr. Ryan has held leadership positions for the AAMC, Council for Medical Education in Pediatrics (COMSEP), Academic Pediatric Association (APA), and the American Medical Association (AMA). He has also received recognition for teaching accomplishments including the APA’s national faculty teaching award (2016) and induction in into the National Academy of Distinguished Educators in Pediatrics (2023). In 2023, Johns Hopkins University recognized him with the “Outstanding Recent Graduate” award.

Dr. Ryan has received substantial formal training in medical education scholarship. In addition to the MEHP, he is currently pursuing a PhD in medical education research at Maastricht University in the Netherlands. Dr. Ryan has published more than 60 peer-reviewed publications and presented more than 100 workshops on medical education topics. His area of focus involves competency-based medical education, however, he has published on a variety of other topics including feedback, teaching techniques, faculty development, instrument development, preceptor recruitment, and curriculum development. He considers himself a generalist in methods with publications that include quantitative, qualitative, mixed methods, and instrument development/validation. Dr. Ryan has secured external funding for educational research through the AAMC, AMA, COMSEP, and the NBME/Stemmler. He has formally taught educational scholarship and curriculum development as an adjunct faculty member for the Johns Hopkins MEHP program since 2014. He has served as a research advisor for students in the MEHP and through the APA’s Educational Scholars Program. A list of his PubMed referenced publications can be found here:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/myncbi/michael.ryan.5/bibliography/public/

Dr. Bradley is Associate Professor of Medical Education and Director of Curriculum Evaluation. In her work, she collaborates with faculty, students, staff and administration to guide the continuous quality improvement efforts of our medical education curriculum, and to evaluate innovative approaches to teaching and assessment. 

 Dr. Bradley grew up in Knoxville, TN (Go Big Orange!) and attended Vanderbilt University where she received a BS in Organizational and Human Development and a Masters in Health Promotion and Wellness. She then moved to beautiful Charlottesville to peruse her PhD in Educational Program Evaluation at UVA in the School of Education and Human Development. Upon completion of her PhD, she worked as a health and wellness educator before joining the faculty in the School of Medicine in 2000. Early in her career, she was a member of a HRSA funded team that focused primarily developing and advancing clinical skills education in UME, before transitioning to her work as Director of Curriculum Evaluation.  

 She is active in medical education research, with a particular interest in Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs), clinical skills education, team-based learning, and evaluation as a learning tool. She enjoys working with faculty and students on their research projects, from idea generation and literature review, to identification of methodology, data collection and analysis, and dissemination. She serves as a member of the Curriculum Committee and the Assessment Committee, as the chair of the GRIME Committee and the Research in Medical Education/ Scholarly Innovation Award Committee, and is a founding member of the EPA Leadership Group and the Brodie Medical Education Fund Committee. She enjoys her regional and national participation with the SGEA and the GEA of the AAMC.  She has been on faculty in the School of Medicine since 2000.  

 Dr. Bradley periodically reflects on the fact that she’s never met anyone, anywhere who has said “I’d like to be a Program Evaluator when I grow up!” yet she considers it her fortunately chosen profession. “Fortunately,” because over her 20-plus year career in the School of Medicine has had the privilege of working with curious and committed students, brilliant and passionate faculty, and dedicated and innovative staff, all of whom are trying to make the medical education curriculum better and stronger each day. She takes a scholarly approach to examining how the educational process works, how things can be done differently and better through innovation, and how to best support faculty, staff and students in these endeavors. She is grateful to be able to honestly say that she learns something new every day. Surely for an academician and dedicated lifelong learner, this is the ultimate in professional satisfaction. 

James R. Martindale, Ph.D., M.Ed. is Associate Professor of Medical Education and Director of Assessment. 

Dr. Martindale was born on Dover Air Force base but has lived in Virginia his entire life.  He received his B.G.S. degree from VCU and the VCU School of Medicine.  At the time, the B.G.S. was unique to Virginia higher education in that it allowed students to develop their own curriculum.  Dr. Martindale focused on Pre-Med science, specifically, physiology, and business (at the “request” of his dad).  Upon graduation and spending a month in Europe, Dr. Martindale came to UVa where he received a master’s degree in Exercise Physiology.  It was also during this time that he obtained an internship with the Washington Commanders football team (different name back then and thankfully changed).  After receiving an offer to remain with the team as an assistant strength and conditioning coach, Dr. Martindale decided that working with professional athletes was not what he wanted to do, and he decided to make another trip to UVa to pursue a doctorate in physiology.  That plan fell apart when he realized he absolutely loved statistics (crazy, right?).  When an offer was made to fund his degree, he abruptly switched programs and received a Ph.D. in educational research with a major in quantitative methodology and psychometrics and a minor in qualitative techniques. 

Dr. Martindale joined the faculty in the School of Medicine in 1995 while completing his dissertation and except for teaching at Illinois State University for a year, has been here since.  He formally took on assessment responsibilities with the launch of the NxGen curriculum in 2010.  As a methodologist working with research teams, Dr. Martindale has published over 40 peer-reviewed papers, given numerous workshops, and has been a part of over 70 peer-reviewed presentations and lectures.  Some of Dr. Martindale’s current research interests include the application of multivariate statistical modeling techniques, latent construct formation and measurement, and the determination of passing standards.  And let’s not forget A.I.! 

Dr. Martindale lives in Albemarle County with his wife of 32 years and their amazing Newfie, Bella.  His three sons are now grown and scattered all over the place with one on the West Coast, one in New York City, and the youngest finishing his degree here at UVa.  Dr. Martindale is always up for a good stats chat so feel free to email him at jrm7e@virginia.edu if you want to engage in some super nerdy stats talk.  However, don’t be surprised if the conversation turns to music and guitar as Dr. Martindale has been a musician for 44 years and spent time in another life as a professional guitarist.  These days, however, it’s a part time endeavor playing with local musicians whenever possible. 

Jessica Greenfield is originally from the west coast and grew up in a military family, having lived in 3 countries and 11 states. She is the daughter of a Special Forces Orthopedic Surgeon and a Vascular Clinical Nurse Specialist (and later Chief of Quality) at Madigan Army Medical Center. She also grew up with her stepfather who was a Neuroanatomist and Alzheimer’s expert who served as a Neurology Residency Program Director, Consultant to the Surgeon General for Neurology, and developed the Traumatic Brain Injury Clinic and screening process for the military.

Jessica attended the University of California, Berkeley, earning BAs in Archeology of Classical Civilizations and Italian Studies. After earning an MA in Italian Studies from the University of Notre Dame, she attended the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, pursuing a PhD in Romance Languages and Literatures. Although her dissertation focused on Sicilian literature and its narrative descriptions of the picturesque, her true expertise and passion is the intersection of material culture and experiential learning – using the island of Sicily as a historical classroom to introduce students to the rich and varied cultural history of the Mediterranean basin.

Jessica served as Italian Language and Culture program coordinator at two different universities (University of North Texas and Vanderbilt University), piquing her interest in performance assessment. After rewriting the test bank for a major publishing company’s textbook resource repository, she went on to publish an Elementary Italian textbook and later accompanying Student Activities Manual at the forefront of the flipped classroom movement. At UNT, Jessica designed a fully immersive faculty-led program for intermediate Italian students in Sicily and creating a joint internship program with the International Business department. Establishing herself as an expert in assessment and evaluation of language proficiency, Jessica is a consultant with the Educational Testing Service and College Board on test development, assessment, and evaluation of the Advanced Placement Italian Language and Culture Examination.

While at Vanderbilt University, Jessica conducted action research in Integrated Performance Assessment, redesigned the Italian language program to be a student-centered and proficiency-based curriculum, consulted with Nashville and Franklin school districts on performance assessment in their language programs, and developed an immersive study abroad program based on participatory pedagogy and networked learning. Working with colleagues from the Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching, she published a book chapter entitled “Networked Learning: Students as producers, curators, and consumers of authentic resources through participatory pedagogy on campus and abroad.” While in Nashville, she was awarded a Fellowship in the Junior Faculty Teaching Program at the Center for Teaching and was also selected as the Center for Second Language Studies’ Scholar-in-Residence where she continued her research in performance assessment of language acquisition.

In 2017, Jessica accepted a position as the Director of the Cooper International Learning Center at Oberlin College and Conservatory, and later an expanded role to include Study Away and Experiential Learning. Through her involvement in the institutional HHMI grant, Jessica completed coursework and was named a Scientific Teaching Fellow through the Yale University Center for Teaching. Subsequently, she was invited to complete a postdoctoral fellowship in Medical Education at the Cleveland Clinic’s Education Institute. She spent time learning and researching about LCME accreditation, competency-based education in both UME and GME, curriculum mapping, and program evaluation. Her capstone project was a qualitative study of the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine’s graduates’ perceptions of their experiences with Programmatic Assessment and how it has influenced them in their practice of medicine, recently published in Medical Science Educator. Concurrently, Jessica earned an MS in Positive Organizational Development and Change Management at Case Western Reserve University’s Weatherhead School of Management.

Jessica joined the UVA SoM in July 2017 in the Office of Evaluation and Assessment. She assists with all aspects of the evaluation program at UVA SoM including course, phase, and curriculum evaluation, faculty evaluation of students, and student evaluation of faculty. She also coordinates the central tracking and LCME compliance around Required Clinical Encounters and Fair and Timely Grading. Jessica also supports the Entrustable Professional Activities Program through compliance reporting and coordination of the Entrustment Committee and EPA Leadership Team.