Volume 40 Number 1 | February 2026
Summary

Clinical laboratory science educators create a lasting impact beyond the classroom by shaping students’ diagnostic reasoning, professional communication, and commitment to patient safety. Through innovative pedagogy, mentorship, and workforce pipeline support, their choices ripple into stronger clinical practice, improved patient outcomes, and a more resilient profession, multiplying excellence across future generations of laboratorians.

How Educators Multiply Professional Impact

Stephanie B. Cochrane, EdD, MLS(ASCP)CM, ASCLS Clinical Laboratory Educators Forum (CLEF) Chair

Stephanie CochraneAt its core, education is legacy work. The true output of teaching is not a grade or a course evaluation, but instead it is years of accurate testing, critical thinking, and patient-centered practice carried out by those we prepare for the bench. Every educator in a clinical laboratory science program carries an impact far greater than the confines of a classroom’s four walls. In a profession often described as “behind the scenes,” clinical laboratory science educators serve as powerful force multipliers whose influence is felt across the healthcare system. 

Multiplying Competence into Clinical Excellence

A single graduating cohort represents hundreds of future interactions with critical values, transfusion decisions, microbial identifications, and complex flow cytometry workups. One faculty member influences dozens of graduates, and each graduate affects thousands of patients. When educators teach students to not only perform tasks but also to reason diagnostically, they embed quality and accuracy into every result that will someday guide patient care. While each lecture, case study, or simulation may feel like a single moment in time, these teaching strategies multiply, rippling outward into thousands of clinical encounters, diagnostic decisions, and patient outcomes. 

“By teaching students to approach results like a diagnostician, this single pedagogical choice has the potential to impact graduates years later when they are the ones who catch a new leukemia, recognize patterns, question discordant results, or detect a laboratory error early.”

The Ripple Effect of a Single Pedagogical Choice

As an educator in a university-based clinical laboratory science program, I want to be known for my innovative teaching strategies and remain intentional about the strategies I select and implement. Teaching innovations such as case-based learning, simulation-rich modules, gamification, or problem-based learning do more than increase student engagement—they strengthen the profession.

As the end of the semester nears, I reflect on the learning outcomes of an AI-driven chatbot activity that I recently created and implemented. When designing this activity, the overall goal was to use AI to strengthen students’ diagnostic reasoning and their reasoning process behind laboratory-based diagnosis. This reflection led me to think about the ripple effect of teaching. That is how a single pedagogical choice extends far beyond the classroom and elevates the profession by elevating the learner’s competence and confidence. By teaching students to approach results like a diagnostician, this single pedagogical choice has the potential to impact graduates years later when they are the ones who catch a new leukemia, recognize patterns, question discordant results, or detect a laboratory error early. All of which leads to improved accuracy and patient outcomes.

When educators refine a case study, they refine how future laboratorians approach ambiguous findings. When educators teach students to confidently interpret patterns or flag a discordant result, they are reinforcing the laboratory’s critical role in upholding patient safety. When educators model professional communication and clinical collaboration, they shape how graduates advocate for the laboratory in multidisciplinary settings. When educators clarify the “why” behind quality control (QC) beyond rules and numbers and connect it to patient safety, graduates become professionals who don’t cut corners with QC but instead uphold Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA) requirements and go on to train others with similar rigor. Therefore, in every instance, the educator’s pedagogical decision becomes a multiplying force that enhances professional practice downstream. 

Creating Long-Term Professional Value

To reiterate, the impact of the clinical laboratory science educator is not limited to the curriculum or classroom. It resides in the moment a struggling student gains confidence, the graduate who emails to share a complex case they solved, or the first-year professional who advocates for proper specimen handling because they received the appropriate training. Better yet, the professional who becomes a supervisor, manager, or educator themselves, thus multiplying the multiplier.

Educators are not always aware of the effects of their teaching; however, I know my purpose is fulfilled when I have graduates reach out to me years later, sharing that the lessons and resources I provided in my courses still guide them in their professional practice. Even graduates who reach out sharing screenshots of abnormal blood cells they have identified while working in hematology warms my heart.

Strengthening the Pipeline through Education

Amid national workforce shortages, educators also multiply impact by sustaining and expanding the pipeline. Recruitment events, K-12 outreach, strong advising, and thoughtfully designed curricula do more than attract students, they preserve the profession. When educators inspire even one student to choose clinical laboratory science, the field gains a lifelong contributor who will support diagnostic excellence for decades.

Similarly, supporting students’ professional engagement ensures the workforce we send forward is not only competent, but connected. When students join ASCLS, participate in research, or pursue graduate education, their growth reflects the guidance and mentorship of the educators who shaped their path.

Without a doubt, I am where I am today, because I had mentors and professors in the undergrad clinical laboratory science program at Winston-Salem State University that poured into me and saw my potential when at times, I didn’t see my own. They played an instrumental role in the educator and leader I am today, and I’m dedicated to providing that same guidance for the students I teach. 

A Profession Strengthened through Educators

As educators, we may not always see the full extent of our professional impact, but it is undeniably there. We shape not only what students know, but how they think, who they become, and how they contribute to healthcare. The laboratory’s future is written in every classroom, simulation, curriculum innovation, and mentorship moment. Through our daily work, we multiply excellence, advocacy, and the profession itself. And in doing so, clinical laboratory science educators remain one of the most powerful, yet often unseen forces driving the future of laboratory medicine. So, as you reflect, what will your teaching legacy be? What activity can you implement to create a meaningful ripple effect? 

References

Stephanie B. Cochrane is Assistant Professor at Rutgers University School of Health Professions in Newark, New Jersey.