Recovery, Healing, and Social Accountability in Medical Education: Rebuilding Learning Communities and Professional Leadership

Medical education in Korea has recently experienced an unprecedented period of social conflict and educational disruption. The prolonged interruption of students’ education, extensive changes to curricula, diminished trust between the medical profession and society, and strained relationships among students, residents, and faculty have prompted fundamental questions about the mission and responsibilities of medical education. This paper examines two questions arising from the 2024 medical crisis: how medical schools can restore damaged relationships and how they can redefine their educational and social responsibilities. This paper draws on major educational theories—including transformative learning, experiential learning, professional identity formation, psychological safety, communities of practice, and social accountability—to propose a framework for rebuilding medical education around recovery. It combines theoretical perspectives with institutional experiences of students’ return to medical school and sets out practical strategies, including recovery-oriented curriculum design, ref lective learning, mentoring, psychologically safe learning environments, reconstruction of learning communities, and strengthened education for social accountability. The central challenge for medical education after the crisis is to go beyond restoring educational operations and rebuild trust, professional relationships, and learning communities. Recovery should be understood as a transformative process in which medical schools cultivate resilience, a strong professional identity, collaborative leadership, and social accountability in physicians while reaffirming medicine’s social mission and rebuilding public trust. Ultimately, recovery-oriented medical education provides a foundation for sustainable educational reform and the renewal of the social contract between the medical profession and society.