Signaling what matters: artifacts, values, and underlying assumptions in medical education

Medical education transmits more than formal knowledge; it signals what matters through formal, informal, and hidden curricula. Drawing on Schein's theory of organizational culture, this commentary synthesizes insights from three 2026 Research in Medical Education (RIME) studies to examine how artifacts, values, and underlying assumptions shape learning environments. The reviewed studies-on multimorbidity in undergraduate medical education, ritualized group handoff in residency, and learner recovery from failure-illustrate how educational practices encode organizational priorities in distinct ways. In curricular structures, multimorbidity is often marginalized or abstracted, signaling the privileging of specialized over integrative, generalist care. In clinical routines, ritualized handoffs align shared values with practices while simultaneously reinforcing hierarchical assumptions. In learner-teacher interactions, responses to failure communicate whether growth and psychological safety are genuinely supported. Together, these studies highlight three mechanisms through which the hidden curriculum operates: invisibly through structural design, explicitly through tightly aligned rituals, and relationally through interpersonal enactment. Highlighting these mechanisms, this research underscores the need for deliberate alignment between educational artifacts and espoused values. Ongoing attention to these signals is essential to cultivating organizational cultures that prepare physicians to navigate complexity, engage meaningfully in practice, and develop resilient professional identities.