Emeritus professor of psychology Prof Henk Schmidt, former dean Erasmus School of Social and Behavioural Sciences (ESSB) and former rector of Erasmus University Rotterdam will receive an honorary doctorate from Canada's McMaster University on 25 May.
Henk Schmidt receives this honorary doctorate for his groundbreaking cognitive-psychological research in the field of problem-based learning and the development of expertise in medicine.
McMaster University is the university where small-group problem-based learning was originally developed.
Schmidt previously investigated this approach to higher education in Maastricht and introduced it to Erasmus University in 2001 at the start of the Bachelor programme Psychology.
About Henk Schmidt
Henk Schmidt is a professor of psychology at ESSB, Erasmus University Rotterdam and founding dean of its problem-based psychology curriculum. Between 2005-2009 he was Dean of ESSB, and between 2009 and 2013, he was the “Rector Magnificus” of Erasmus University. Previously, Schmidt held academic positions as professor of cognitive psychology, faculty of psychology, Maastricht University, and as professor of health professions education at the same university.
His research areas of interest are learning and memory, and he has published on problem-based learning, long-term memory, and the development of expertise in medicine. He has published more than 400 articles in refereed journals, chapters in books, and books; alone or together with his 50+ PhD.-students. His Google Scholar H-index is presently 108. Twice he received the ”Outstanding paper by an established investigator” Award of the American Educational Research Association. In 1996 the Université de Sherbrooke in Canada awarded him an honorary degree. In 2004, the Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden, announced him to be the first winner of its international medical education research prize for his work in medical expertise and problem-based learning.
In 2006, he received the Distinguished Career Award of the American Educational Research Association, Division I. In 2015, the journal Academic Medicine identified him to be the most-cited medical education researcher between 1970 and 2015. He is the founding editor-in-chief of three journals: Advances in Health Sciences Education, Health Professions Education, and Education for Health.
Henk Schmidt is currently working at the Institute of Medical Education Research Rotterdam, part of the Erasmus MC.
- More information
Marjolein Kooistra, communications ESSB, kooistra@essb.eur.nl