The Personal Touch

The BCRP is a family made up of over 150 residents, program directors and administrative staff. Many residents have recently moved to Boston, some with partners and young children and all are working hard to balance their busy professional and personal lives. We value providing a strong support network for our residents, and we strive to give the BCRP community as many opportunities as possible to spend time together outside the hospital.

Intern Orientation

New interns participate in a unique two-week orientation before their first day of work. This time is dedicated to helping interns explore Boston, learn their way around the hospitals, take care of logistics, and – most importantly – get to know their new family so they can hit the ground running having already forged many of the friendships that will continue throughout the rest of their lives. During Orientation, incoming interns participate in structured modules that highlight a variety of important areas such as communication, professionalism, humanism, resident wellness, individualized learning plans and procedural competency; complete certification courses in PALS and NRP; get oriented to the wards and emergency departments in which they will soon be working; and enjoy a variety of social activities, such as:

Traditional New England clambake and lobster fest
Red Sox games
Chief Family Dinners
Happy Hours
And more…

New Interns at Red Sox game during Orientation

Enjoying a rooftop view of Boston at a chief family dinner

Pictures of the residents during orientation

Mentorship and Advising

Getting to know new interns at the LEAD chief family dinner during orientation

The BCRP strives to provide the best possible educational experience for each and every resident, to foster personal and professional growth, and to encourage the pursuit of individual passions. Our program prides itself on carefully guiding residents along their chosen career path in order to help them become leaders in clinical care, research, medical education, quality improvement, advocacy, or other areas of their choosing. We believe that people need multiple mentors along multiple domains to accelerate their careers and maintain their drive. We provide multiple avenues for this, with built-in opportunities to connect residents with personal, project, and longitudinal mentorship and coaching.

Personal and Project Mentorship

Personal mentoring often occurs at the level of the Chief Family—a cohort of about 30 residents led by a Chief Resident. Families are also broken down into smaller, nuclear families with junior and senior residents serving as “big sibling” mentors for interns. Siblings and Chiefs often advocate for residents in many forums and provide near-peer guidance on personal and professional balance.

For URiM residents, MentorMed is a structured opt-in mentorship program within the BCRP that matches URiM residents with URiM faculty for longitudinal mentorship. Often, faculty share similar backgrounds, research interests, and other commonalities which residents have found to be extremely helpful in navigating their early carriers in medicine.

Residents also often use their specific Academy (discussed more in depth elsewhere) to find faculty mentors to help them build subject matter expertise and work together on research projects. The Academy’s Faculty Advisors, affiliated faculty members, and Chief Residents organize specific opportunities for residents to identify faculty mentors through networking events, career nights, and research-in-progress events, among others. Well-connected faculty members who are experts in their field often then become sponsors for residents to launch their careers as well.

Longitudinal Career Advising

Residents meet with their Chief parent and Associate Program Director regularly to discuss their clinical performance and career aspirations. In these meetings, residents receive feedback from peer and faculty assessments, and discuss progress made towards individual personal and professional goals identified in their Individualized Learning Plans.

Residents are also paired with a TEACH faculty coach, who guides their journey as a medical educator and provides feedback on educational conferences and supervising. As of 2023, the BCRP is also piloting a more extensive coaching program, focused on resident personal, professional, and career growth, grounded in each individual resident’s goals. The program is being co-created by residents and program leaders to best support resident needs.

Finally, residents in the LEAD track are additionally partnered with a faculty member who serves as their Portfolio Advisor. This advisor serves as a thought and accountability partner to help LEAD residents continue to revisit their equity and advocacy-related career goals and passions throughout residency.

Housestaff Lounge

The Housestaff Lounge at Boston Children’s Hospital is a recently renovated, casual space dedicated to BCRP residents. It contains workspaces with computers, printer, a fax/scanner and individual mailboxes; a Keurig coffee machine with free coffee and tea; a microwave and a full-size refrigerator (stocked with seltzers and soda); and a 50-inch HD television with surround sound. Residents use this room to relax, to gather for informal meetings, and for various morning and lunchtime conferences. The BCRP also has their own Peloton bike that is located in one of the resident call rooms with a shared account open for all residents to use throughout the year.