Academic trainee representation at the RCOG

This page provides information about how academic trainees are represented at the RCOG.

Academic Board

The Academic Board promotes all aspects of academic O&G, including undergraduate and postgraduate training, recruitment into academic O&G and retention.

Academic trainees’ representatives on the Academic Board

There is a senior and a junior academic trainees’ representative on the Academic Board:

• The junior academic trainees’ representative is Dr Robbie Kerr. Robbie is an ST4 and has entered his second year as an Academic Clinical Fellow in the Sanyu Research Unit at Liverpool Women’s Hospital. The Sanyu Unit specialises in low cost technologies for improving global maternal and newborn health. Dr Kerr’s research interest is international maternal health, specifically: evaluation of obstetrics training in low-resource settings, induction of labour and postpartum haemorrhage. He is motivated to improve opportunities for those at all stages of their training to get involved in research in obstetrics and gynaecology.
• The senior academic trainees’ representative is Dr Bassel Wattar. Bassel Wattar is a Doctoral Candidate at Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry - Queen Mary University of London and a Clinical Research Fellow at The Royal London Hospital- Barts Health NHS Trust. Bassel is current Chair and co-founder of the UK Trainee Research and Audit Collaborative in O+G (UKARCOG), and co-founder of the Midland Research and Audit Trainee Collaborative (MROG). In addition Dr Wattar is an organizing member of the Katherine Twining Network Women’s Health Research Network, a UK Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and a member of the Faculty of Medical Leadership and Management. He has a special interest in evidence synthesis, systematic reviews, meta-analysis and medical education.

To contact the academic trainees’ representatives, email the Policy Coordinator (Advanced Training).

Undergraduate work in the Academic Board

The Academic Board’s role in the development of undergraduate academic work in O&G includes:

• Supporting and developing those involved in planning and delivering undergraduate programmes in O&G at UK medical schools
• Supporting and encouraging undergraduate students wanting to develop an interest in O&G, particularly academic aspects of the specialty, in the future

The Academic Board also collates a range of useful information for undergraduates interested in academic O&G:

• Contact details for leaders in undergraduate O&G programme planning and delivery in their institutions; to contact the undergraduate leads as a group (it’s not possible to send an email to a specific individual), email the Policy Coordinator (Advanced Training)
• Contact details for external assessors for O&G undergraduate assessments
• A list of intercalated and MSc degrees

Postgraduate work in the Academic Board

The Academic Board’s role in the development of postgraduate academic training in O&G includes:

• Developing the academic curriculum summarised in the academic matrix
• Supporting the annual academic review process for academic trainees
• Helping to identify academic supervisors
• Developing a database of clinical academics to determine academic activity in O&G in the UK, the progression of academic trainees through their careers and the value of their academic training
• Developing the academic trainee mentorship scheme
• Organising the RCOG’s Annual Academic Meeting

Elsewhere on the site