mahan.kulasegaram@utoronto.ca   

Dr. Kulamakan (Mahan) Kulasegaram is a Scientist at the Wilson Centre and Temerty Faculty of Medicine where he is the Temerty Chair in Learner Assessment and Program Evaluation. Additionally, he is an Associate Professor and Director of the Office of Education Scholarship in the Department of Family & Community Medicine.

Mahan's research advances our understanding of how assessment can be used to enhance learning. At the learner level, using theories from psychology and psychometrics, his research explores how assessment practices can enhance the transfer of learning - an important step for developing clinical expertise in medicine. At the level of the education program and system, he studies how assessment 'big data' can be used to improve program practices and outcomes. His research addresses the entire continuum of training from undergraduate to continuing education and reexamines the entire context of assessment - the objectives, process, tools, learners, and assessors. The next stage of this research - supported by the Temerty Chair in Learner Assessment - is utilizing assessment big data to understand opportunities to optimize programs and their impact on learners, teachers, and eventual clinical care. He is developing models with national and international collaborators to facilitate education data sharing within and between institutions as well as identifying best practices in this new area for medical education. Notably, in 2021-22, he co-lead the development of a national consensus statement on principles for ethical and equitable data-sharing governance informed by national stakeholders in medical education followed by an international Ottawa consensus statement (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38306211/). His program of research has led to significant changes in the practice of assessment at the University of Toronto and other institutions. Mahan also conducts research in instructional & curriculum design, as well as in admissions and selection to medical education. He is currently accepting PhD students in all of the above areas.

Keywords: assessment, big data, transfer of learning, clinical reasoning, curriculum, admissions, medical education  

Current Fellows and HPER Doctoral Students: Sally Binks, Conrad Tsang