Deena Shin McRae, MD
Associate Vice President, Academic Health Sciences
University of California Health
University of California Office of the President
Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry, UC Irvine School of Medicine
Friday November 21, 2025,
5pm-6:30pm PST
Workshop Description:
Are you navigating a nontraditional path to medicine and wondering how it can lead to real leadership and impact? Join Deena Shin McRae, MD, Associate Vice President of Academic Health Sciences for the University of California, for a candid, strategy-filled conversation about turning setbacks into purpose and building a career that serves patients and systems. She’ll connect the dots between admissions, training, and the statewide UC ecosystem—21 health professional schools, 16,000 learners, and countless pathways—so you can chart an intentional route from community college or university to residency and beyond. Learn how to leverage mentorship, pick experiences that actually matter, translate lived experience into mission-driven applications, and cultivate skills that open doors to leadership, including wellness, equity-minded practice, and team stewardship. This is your moment to come, ask your questions and get answers. Most importantly, come hear directly from the source instead of second hand or bad information or people that have no clue about the admission process. Leave with clarity, concrete next steps, and the confidence to lead big in medical school and beyond.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Deena Shin McRae is the Associate Vice President of Academic Health Sciences for University of California. In this role, Dr. McRae provides leadership, strategic direction, policy guidance, and advocacy on behalf of the University’s health sciences and clinical training system. The University of California operates one of the largest public health sciences instruction programs in the nation with more than 16,000 students and residents across 21 schools. Schools include medicine, nursing, pharmacy, public health, dentistry, optometry, and veterinary medicine.
One of the top priorities for Dr. McRae and her Academic Health Sciences office is to expand the state’s health care workforce to serve our diverse communities’ needs. This is accomplished through innovative pathway programs and the growth of the state’s health professional school system, graduating clinicians who are committed to improving access to high-quality care and addressing health care disparities.
Related to this health equity work, Dr. McRae also leads the University of California Brain and Behavioral Health Consortium, which is identifying ways that UC Health can improve California communities’ access to behavioral health care services.
On the state level, Dr. McRae has an appointment on the California Health Workforce Education and Training Council, which is part of the Health Care Access and Information (HCAI) agency. And she co-leads the California Medical Association’s Academic Practice Forum. On a national level, Dr. McRae is the chair for the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) Group on Resident Affairs national steering committee.
Prior roles include Associate Dean for Graduate Medical Education and Designated Institutional Official (DIO) at the UC Irvine School of Medicine, and the Associate Chief of Staff for Education and Designated Education Officer (DEO) at the Tibor Rubin VA Medical Center in Long Beach, California. Before those roles, Dr. McRae served as the Psychiatry Residency Program Director at UC Irvine. Also at UC Irvine, she was the founder and chair of both the UC Irvine School of Medicine Wellness and Professionalism Committee and the UC Irvine Physician Peer Support program. She also helped establish the UCI School of Medicine Clinical Faculty Equity and Diversity Advisory Committee.
Dr. McRae has maintained her faculty position in the Department of Psychiatry at the UC Irvine School of Medicine as a clinical professor.
Dr. McRae obtained her Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Pennsylvania, completed her medical school and psychiatry residency training at UC Irvine, and trained at the Beck Institute for Cognitive Therapy and Research. She is also a graduate of the Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine (ELAM) fellowship program at Drexel University.
Register for Free:
What: Charting a Nontraditional Path to Medicine: The Unlikely Road to UC Health Leadership
When: Friday, November 21, 2025, 5 PM (Pacific Standard Time)
You will receive an immediate email confirmation of your registration from Zoom. PLEASE check your SPAM or JUNK folder, as the email might be directed there. Additionally, you will receive an email reminder from Zoom ONE hour before the event, sent to the same email address you used for registration.
