Research Grant success from the Department of Medical Education

Collaborations between researchers from the Department of Medical Education (DME), MMS clinical sites, and international centres, have resulted in research examining different facets of learning and teaching in clinical placements and within the MD program.

Assoc Prof Stephen Lew, Director of Medical Education; Dr Jennifer Schwarz from Western Clinical School; Dr Petrina Barson, Honorary Fellow in the Department of General Practice; and Assoc Prof Clare Delany from DME, received funding from a University Learning and Teaching Initiative Grant to teach and evaluate an Empathy and Compassion program for MD students.

Dr Anna Ryan and the assessment team have been awarded funding from the Stemmler Medical Education Research Fund for a multi-institutional research project involving collaboration with the University of Toronto in Canada. The project, Timing and content of feedback for test-enhanced transfer of learning through multiple-choice questions, will explore the impact of different forms of post-test feedback on transfer of medical knowledge within a test-enhanced learning framework.

Professor Liz Molloy leads a team to conduct a pilot project at Western Health investigating the benefits to health services of medical student clinical placements. The project, Medical Student Clinical Placements as Sites of Learning and Teaching, is funded by the Medical Deans of Australia and New Zealand

And finally, congratulations to Dr Anna Ryan and Dr Terry Judd for their well-deserved success in being the inaugural recipients of the MDHS Award for Program Innovation. This award recognises their program of turning student assessment data into feedback to aid student learning.