Monday, March 17, 2025 at 10 p.m. on KPBS TV / PBS app
"The Calling: A Medical School Journey," a new documentary directed by Asako Gladsjo, follows the intellectual and emotional journey of a group of students at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx. Captured through verité scenes and personal video diaries, the film offers a rare inside look at America’s health care system through the eyes of these aspiring practitioners as they learn what it takes to become a doctor in one of the country’s most underserved communities.
Filmed over the course of a year, the documentary follows the students as they share the humbling challenges they face, their crises of self-doubt and exhaustion, and the moments of encouragement that inspire them to go on.
The film follows the journey of eight remarkable students, including:
• Alexandra, a fourth-year student and the youngest daughter of Dominican immigrants, who hopes to find a family medicine residency that will allow her to stay in the Bronx and serve the community she loves.
• Andrew, a Haitian American first-year student from Queens, who hopes to mentor other aspiring physicians from underrepresented backgrounds.
• Chetali, a third-year student from the Detroit area, who feels called to emergency medicine, a field that links the social side of medicine to a wide range of specialties and embodies her desire to care for patients of all backgrounds.
• Cameron, a third-year student from Yonkers, who comes from a family of nurses and hopes to become the first doctor in his family, with a specialty in orthopedics or sports medicine.
• Cory, a third-year student from New Jersey who is driven by a life-threatening childhood illness that required multiple brain surgeries and is interested in pursuing a career in pediatric neurology.
• Ghaith, a first-year student originally from Syria, who credits his parents — both doctors — with inspiring his decision to pursue a career in cardiology.
• Jordan, a first-year student from New Jersey and a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army Reserve, who is attending medical school through an Army scholarship program. His father, a New York City firefighter who perished in the Sept. 11 attacks, inspired him to serve.
• Le’Shauna, a fourth-year student and the first in her family to attend college, who dreams of leaving the harsh urban environment that has shaped her family’s past and hopes to secure a radiology residency at a top hospital in the South.
Filmed in the corridors and classrooms at Albert Einstein — which announced in February 2024 that it is now tuition-free, thanks to a $1 billion gift from longtime faculty member Dr. Ruth Gottesman — and at its teaching hospital, Montefiore Medical Center, "The Calling: A Medical School Journey" follows the first-year students as they struggle to keep up with the punishing workload, meet and dissect their first cadavers, and engage with real patients for the first time.
Meanwhile, the third-year students rotate through different medical specialties, juggling long shifts in the hospital with marathon study sessions for the all-important exams that will help determine where they will do their residencies. Through it all, the film chronicles the students’ hopes, fears and incredible growth as they navigate the many challenges facing today’s medical practitioners.
Filmmaker Quotes:
“Meeting the students, faculty and physician mentors at Einstein was such a humbling experience,” said director Gladsjo. “I hope that young people from diverse backgrounds who might consider pursuing medicine will take inspiration from the film’s subjects and make our health care system better for everyone.”
“Our medical education systems are under a great deal of scrutiny these days,” says Tim Smith, who developed the film project and is an executive producer. “This film will give its viewers confidence that tomorrow’s doctors have both the heart and intellectual firepower to make medical care better for all of us.”
Watch On Your Schedule: "The Calling: A Medical School Journey" will stream simultaneously with broadcast and be available on all station-branded PBS platforms, including PBS.org and the PBS app, available on iOS, Android, Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, Samsung Smart TV, Chromecast and Vizio.
Credits: A Cineflix Media and HHMI Tangled Bank Studios Production, in association with The WNET Group. Directed by Asako Gladsjo. Executive producers: Tim Smith, Charles Tremayne, J.C. Mills, Wilma L. Davis, Sean B. Carroll. For The WNET Group: Benjamin Phelps is supervising producer, Lesley Norman is executive producer, and Stephen Segaller is executive in charge.
