A virtual near-peer mentorship research program focused on healthcare disparities in the United States of America

To promote health equity, it is crucial to educate the next generation of healthcare workers about disparities early on during their education. We developed a virtual research program at a medical school in the United States of America with the goal of increasing the awareness of youth about the complexities of health inequities. The program was based on a near-peer mentorship where high school students were coached by medical student mentors under the oversight of an experienced faculty mentor. We evaluated the participants’ perspectives about the program using a mixed quantitative and qualitative method. Upon completion of the program, the participants were asked to complete a survey and rate their self-perceived knowledge, efficacy skills, and interest in addressing health disparities in the future. Additionally, the participants’ perspectives about the program were gathered using open-ended questions and analyzed using thematic analysis. Our preliminary findings indicate that the pr..., An anonymous survey was distributed to high school and medical student coaches via REDCap hosted at our university. Some of the responses were based on a Likert Scale of 1-4, with 4 being the most positive outcome. In the manuscript, the average of Likert Scales was calculated for each question., , # Data set: A virtual near-peer mentorship research program focused on healthcare disparities in the United States of America

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.xsj3tx9np](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.xsj3tx9np)
Two Excel files from REDCap are included in the data set. One includes the responses of the high school students and the other includes the responses of the medical students.

## Description of the data and file structure

The questions of the survey are on the first row of the Excel file and the responses of each of the participants are summarized on each row after the first row. The responses to some of the questions use a Likert Scale of 1-4, and 4 representing the most positive outcome.

##