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SACME 2025 Speakers

The 2025 theme is Advocacy in Action: Empowering CPD/CE Professionals to Lead Change and we have a lineup of empowering change-makers to present our plenary sessions and workshops.

Plenary Speakers  - go to Workshop Speakers

Monday, March 17, 2025, 8:30 am
Barbara Barnes Plenary 

Advocacy in Leadership: Speaking Truth to Power!


Constance LeBlanc, CCFP(EM), MAEd, CCPE, MBAProfessor, Department of Emergency Medicine
Dalhousie University

Dr. Constance LeBlanc holds a Master of Arts in Education in Curriculum Studies, with a focus on the Hidden Curriculum as well as an EMBA in Business and Technology. She is a recent recipient of a certification in Diversity as a Canadian Certified Inclusion Professional. Her areas for scholarship focus on equity, diversity, inclusivity, and accessibility (EDIA); medical education; and leadership.

Dr. LeBlanc is Métis, francophone, has a mixed-race family, and was the first woman Emergency Physician at the Charles V. Keating Emergency and Trauma Center in Halifax Nova Scotia. She practices clinically, mentors, and supports women in her environment and produces scholarship on EDIA. She was recognized for her work as the recipient of the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians (CAEP) Emergency Physician of the year in 2019 and the CAEP President’s Award in 2022. She has served two terms as Associate Dean of Continuing Professional Development and Medical Education Research at Dalhousie University in Canada.

Since July 2023, she has served as president and CEO of the Association of Faculties of Medicine of Canada.


Monday, March 17, 2025, 1:30 pm 

Training Health Justice Leaders for Real Policy and Population Health Impact


Bethany Hamilton, JD
Director, National Center for Medical-Legal Partnership
Milken Institute School of Public Health

Bethany Hamilton has spent her career working at the intersection of health equity and social justice. She most recently served as Deputy Director, State Affairs at the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC), where she led projects focused on expanding Medicaid, defending the Affordable Care Act, and strengthening the ability of community health centers to carry out their mission.She advanced health care workforce development initiatives as part of NACHC’s Community HealthCorps Program, and began her career as an Equal Justice Works AmeriCorps Legal Fellow at Legal Assistance of Western NY, where she built a re-entry law clinic and co-managed a law student summer associate program. As a former member of NCMLP’s Advisory Council from 2014-2019, she served as a bridge between the two sectors and was part of the team that oversaw NCMLP’s transition to become a federally-funded technical assistance hub for health centers.



Ellen Lawton, JD
Senior Fellow Health Begins

Ellen Lawton leads training and technical assistance for the national Health Housing and Justice Initiative, a partnership with Kaiser Permanente and the National Center for Medical-Legal Partnership. A national expert in the integration of legal professionals into the health care setting to address the social determinants of health, Ellen helped found and then led the National Center for Medical-Legal Partnership at George Washington University from 2001-2020. She is internationally recognized for her leadership in developing the medical-legal partnership model having published leading articles describing this work in clinical and legal journals. She received the Innovations in Legal Services Award from the National Legal Aid and Defender Association and was a member of the Legal Services Corporation’s 2019 Opioid Use Task Force. She is also a member of the board of directors of the Institute for Community Health.


Tuesday, March 18, 2025, 8:30 am 

Positioning Your Organization for Success:  The Strategic Role of CE/CPD


Ayelet Kuper, MD, DPhil
Scientist and Associate Director at the Wilson Centre and an Associate Professor in the University of Toronto Department of Medicine and President of AMEE

Ayelet Kuper, DPhil, is a scientist and associate director at the Wilson Centre for Research in Education, University Health Network/University of Toronto, and an associate professor in the University of Toronto Department of Medicine. She practices medicine within the Division of General Internal Medicine at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, where she attends on the Clinical Teaching Unit. She is interested in the kinds of knowledge and of knowledge production practices we see as legitimate within medical education and medicine more broadly, and in the ideas, individuals, and groups that are included or excluded. She has published more than 80 peer-reviewed papers.

Workshop Speakers

Sunday, March 16, 2025, 9 am to 11 am ET

From Data to Action: Using Evidence to Advocate for Your Office

Linda Caples, PhD

Director Continuing and Professional Development, Medical College of Wisconsin



Generative AI for Innovative Multimedia in Continuing Professional Development: Practical Tools and Ethical Insights

Heather MacNeill, MD, BSc(PT), MScCH(HPTE), FRCPC, Faculty Lead, Educational Technologies, CPD, University of Toronto






Ken Masters, PhD, HDE, FDE
, Associate Professor: Medical Informatics, Sultan Quboos University







Sofia Valanci, MD, PhD,
Program Advisor, Learning Strategy, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada



Sunday, March 16, 2025, 1 pm to 3 pm ET


Podcasting Fun-0-1: An Introduction to Podcasting in Healthcare Professional Education

Brian S. McGowan, PhD, FACEhp
Chief Learning Officer & Co-Founder, ArcheMedX, Inc.

Dr. McGowan has served in leadership positions in numerous medical educational organizations and commercial supporters and is a Fellow of the Alliance (FACEhp). He founded the Outcomes Standardization Project, launched and hosted the Alliance Podcast, and most recently launched and hosts the JCEHP Emerging Best Practices in CPD podcast. In 2012 he Co-Founded ArcheMedX, Inc, a healthcare informatics and e-learning company to apply his research in practice. You can follow him on X (formerly Twitter) (@BrianSMcGowan) and connect with him on Linkedin.


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