This interview is one in a series of interviews with the 2026 recipients of the ACGME Awards. These awardees join an outstanding group of previous honorees whose work and contributions to graduate medical education (GME) represent the best in the field. They will be honored at the 2026 ACGME Annual Educational Conference, taking place February 19-21, 2026, in San Diego, California.
2026 Parker J. Palmer Courage to Teach Awardee Salahuddin Kazi, MD is the Residency Director for internal medicine and Vice Chair of Education at UT Southwestern Medical Center.
ACGME: How did you become involved in medicine, and in academic medicine specifically?
Kazi: Greatly influenced by my father who was a surgeon, I grew up watching medicine not just as a profession, but as a form of service woven into everyday life. I trained initially in Pakistan and later in the United States, and crossing those systems shaped how I see medicine as both deeply local and universally human. When I arrived in the US for training, I was struck by how much of who we become as physicians is shaped not only by patients, but by the learning environments we inhabit. I realized early on that I loved bedside medicine, but I was just as drawn to teaching, mentoring, and the design of learning systems. Academic medicine, for me, became the place where all those interests began to live together.
ACGME: What does this award mean to you?
Kazi: This award is profoundly humbling. I have long admired Parker Palmer’s writing because it speaks to teaching as an act of identity and courage, not just technique. To receive an award in his name feels less like a personal achievement and more like a reflection of the many teachers who took risks on me, the colleagues who walk alongside me, and the residents who continually teach me how to be better. I see it as a reminder that teaching is not transactional; it is relational, moral, and deeply human.
ACGME: What do you feel is the most important job the program director has?
Kazi: The most important job of a program director is to protect the learning environment. If the environment is grounded in trust and clarity of purpose, extraordinary growth can happen. My role is to hold that space steady while the clinical and regulatory worlds constantly shift. In practical terms, that means advocating for residents, building fair and humane systems, and making sure that education remains the primary mission, even during times of operational pressure.
ACGME: What is the most rewarding part of your job?
Kazi: Without question, it is watching people grow. Seeing a resident who once doubted themselves stand confidently at the bedside, teach a junior learner, or comfort a family never gets old. The privilege of being present for those quiet moments of transformation is what sustains me. Years later, when former residents reach out to share where life has taken them, I am reminded that education echoes far beyond the walls of the hospital.
ACGME: What is the most challenging?
Kazi: The hardest part of my work is living at the intersection of competing demands: human needs; system constraints; regulatory requirements; and the accelerating pace of change in medicine. Residents are training at a time of extraordinary complexity and emotional load. Supporting their growth while also navigating staffing pressures, documentation requirements, and institutional realities is a constant balancing act. The challenge is to prevent the system from crowding out the soul of the work.
ACGME: What advice do you have for residents or fellows who may be interested in pursuing a career in academic medicine?
Kazi: Pay attention to what gives you energy, not just what builds your CV. Academic medicine is sustained by curiosity, generosity, and a willingness to keep learning in public. Seek mentors who are honest with you and who model both excellence and humanity. Say yes to teaching earlier than feels comfortable. And, remember that careers in academia are built incrementally through relationships and small, meaningful contributions over time, not through a single defining moment.
ACGME: What is one idea that guides you?
Kazi: One idea that guides me is that academic leaders should “teach systems as well as individuals.” When learners understand not only the patient in front of them, but also the structures that shape care, they become empowered not just to deliver medicine, but to improve it.
Learn more about the ACGME’s Parker J. Palmer Courage to Teach Award here. Register for #ACGME2026 on our conference website, where we will continue to celebrate this year’s honorees.