BRAINterns 2.0: Durability of Webinar-Based Education and Social Media Beyond the Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic

BACKGROUND: Webinars offer novel educational op-portunities beyond those of traditional, in-person experi-ences. BRAINterns is an open-access webinar-based education platform created to replace opportunities lost during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. This pro-gram previously showed the efficacy of webinars to expand access to careers in medicine, and in particular, neurosurgery. BRAINterns 2.0 was established to assess the durability of Web-based learning.METHODS: A modified 4-week webinar series was held during July 2021. A retrospective exit survey was distrib-uted to participants and responses analyzed.RESULTS: A total of 16,045 people registered for BRAINterns 2.0, representing 103 countries. Survey re-sponses were received from 3765 participants (23% response rate). New, first-time registrants comprised 66% of participants, with the rest being returning par-ticipants. A total of 342 students participated in a dedicated module delivered entirely in Spanish. Females represented 81% of respondents. Participants identified that desirable elements of the program were opportu- -ities to hear from women (53%) and people of color (44%) in health care. Participants heard about the series through TikTok (n = 1251; 33%), Instagram (n = 1109; 29%), Facebook (n = 637; 17%), and word of mouth (n = 708; 19%) with assistance from an ambassador program.CONCLUSIONS: Webinar-based education programs continue to be of interest to students in an increasingly digital world. Social media, and specifically the use of educational ambassadors, are effective to improve visi-bility of educational programs across a diverse population of students. Understanding the desires of participants is critical to building a successful online education platform.