Medical education scholar Lorelei Lingard elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada

Lorelei Lingard, PhD, a professor at Schulich Medicine & Dentistry and a leader in health professions education, has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, one of the country’s highest academic honours. She is one of nine Western scholars elected in 2026, a record for the university.

Her research has shaped how communication and teamwork are understood and taught in medical training, and has informed policy, curriculum and assessment across Canada. She also studies research methods and scientific writing.

A central idea in her work is collective competence: the view that high-quality care depends on how well practitioners work together, not only on each person’s abilities. Lingard says her interdisciplinary research bridges education, medicine, humanities and social sciences, and she is now exploring how collective competence can be assessed so teams can get feedback on it.