Preceptor of the Year (2025-2026)

“I want students to learn how to be the pharmacist they want to be.”

When Caitlin Thompson was informed that she was selected as one of the 2025-2026 Preceptor of the Year award recipients, she was initially surprised and, admittedly, even a bit confused. For her, after precepting for roughly five years, she is really only doing what feels natural.

“When you’re in the pharmacy, it’s easy to get caught up in just doing the job yourself. It’s go-go-go all the time,” she says. “While it might be easier or faster for me to complete a task myself, I stop and think ‘Can a student do this?’. If the answer is yes, then I involve them.”

This simple mindset shift creates countless opportunities for students to learn through experience. She believes that confidence is built through participation, repetition, and practice, and not by watching from the sidelines. Mina Riad, a student from the Class of 2028 who nominated Caitlin for the award, commended her approach, saying, “Caitlin never treated me as just a student who was only meant to sit there and listen, but instead, she always asked what my opinions and thoughts were about each situation.”

She encourages students to think critically and develop their own problem-solving skills. Mina added that Caitlin was “always guiding me to come to the right answer on my own, and never tried to take opportunities away from me to learn by giving me the answers immediately”. Her commitment to creating a safe learning environment is evident: “There was no shame in any mistake I made, and under her guidance, it only seemed to further my understanding of the pharmaceutical workflow.”

Mina’s reflections illustrate Caitlin’s intentions and what she hopes students gain from their rotations. “I want students to learn how to be the pharmacist they want to be,” she explains, “The clinical aspect is important, but I also want them to learn about people, whether they are patients, colleagues, or other healthcare professionals.” By emphasizing relationships alongside clinical knowledge, she helps students develop the interpersonal and communication skills that are fundamental to community pharmacy practice. Mina reflected on the impact of those interactions, writing that Caitlin gave him “an excellent example of how pharmacists ought to interact with their patients and listen to their concerns.”

Caitlin is quick to acknowledge the support that made her precepting journey possible. She credits her manager for providing her the opportunity to begin precepting and the whole Warman Co-op Pharmacy team for supporting experiential learning within the pharmacy. She also notes that precepting has helped her grow professionally by keeping her engaged, current, and continually learning. Rather than viewing teaching as a one-way transfer of knowledge, Caitlin sees it as a collaborative learning experience. “The more you, as a pharmacist and preceptor, are invested, the more the student will get out of it,” she explains, “We learn together.”

For Caitlin, every student represents more than a learner completing a rotation. They are future pharmacists, future colleagues, and future contributors to the profession she cares deeply about. “A student could become a future colleague,” she says, “That’s important to remember.”

The qualities that Caitlin views as simply part of her everyday practice—intentionally involving students, encouraging independent thinking, and creating a welcome and safe environment for learning—are the very qualities her students remember most. It is this commitment to helping students become not only knowledgeable pharmacists, but compassionate professionals who understand the people behind the prescriptions, that makes her a deserving recipient of this year’s Preceptor of the Year award.