The Office of Global Affairs is pleased to announce that Victoria E. Forbes, MD, MS, Assistant Professor of Medicine at UConn Health, has been selected as UConn’s nominee for the Universitas 21 Health Sciences Group (U21 HSG) Teaching Excellence Award. This Award celebrates exceptional and innovative teaching in the U21 HSG network.

The Teaching Excellence award offers early to mid-career faculty of U21 HSG member universities a valuable opportunity to develop new collaborations, to work internationally, and to share their pedagogical expertise with others. UConn’s internal review panel selected Dr. Forbes from a record high pool of applicants due to her strong teaching record, international teaching collaborations, and innovative approach to global medical education.

U21 will review the application of each member institution’s nominee for evidence of the impact of the nominee’s activities in the areas of international collaboration, interdisciplinarity, and sustained excellence in teaching. Two winners will be announced in August and will jointly facilitate a workshop at the 2024 U21 HSG Annual Meeting.

The U21 Health Sciences Group, a subgroup of the Universitas 21 Consortium, was established in 2000 to provide members with a framework for pursuing collaborative research opportunities, information exchange, and resource sharing across the Health Sciences. UConn is the only representative of the United States in the group, which includes nineteen other institutions from Australia, Canada, Chile, China, Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

For more information about the Teaching Excellence Award or the U21 Health Sciences Group, please contact Allison Casaly at allison.casaly@uconn.edu.