Dr Kirsty Alexander
ScotGEM Lecturer in Medical Education
Undergraduate Medicine, School of Medicine
Contact
Biography
Kirsty is the ScotGEM Lecturer in Medical Education at the School of Medicine, University of Dundee. My role is focussed on the evaluation of the Scottish Graduate Entry Medicine (ScotGEM) programme and research into related areas - generalism, rural medicine and innovative curricula.
Kirsty’s academic background is in the Humanities. In 2010, Kirsty achieved an MA with First Class Hons in German and International Relations from the University of St Andrews. After graduation, she worked in widening participation to medicine, which led to her interest in access to healthcare education.
In 2015, Kirsty was awarded a fully funded PhD position at the University of Aberdeen. She graduated in 2018 with a thesis entitled: Perceptions, discourses and values: Exploring how key stakeholders construct, negotiate and enact widening access to medical school. Her supervisory team was Prof Jennifer Cleland, Prof Sandra Nicolson and Dr Tania Fahey Palma.
Between 2019 and 2022 Kirsty worked at the Research Department for Medical Education (RDME) at University College London (UCL). She moved to her current position at the University of Dundee in March 2022.
Research
Kirsty’s research focus is on getting the right people into and through medical education, and into the right jobs: How can we ensure a medical workforce which is fit for purpose in terms of meeting population healthcare need, especially to generalist specialties, rural and underserved areas?
Kirsty engages in robust and conceptually driven research which has practical utility. Her methodological expertise is primarily qualitative, including Critical Discourse Analysis and Realist Evaluation. Kirsty has extensive experience conducting and analysing interviews and focus groups. She is also comfortable working on mixed-methods studies, including “big data” studies such as those using the UK Medical Education Database (UKMED).
Kirsty’s research areas include: Workforce Impact; Widening Participation; Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI).
Kirsty is currently co-supervising a PhD project with Prof Katherine Woolf (UCL) and Dr Anouk Wouters (Amsterdam UMC) entitled: “An exploration of the impact of contextual information in selection processes by UK medical schools” with PhD candidate Kate McCarthy.
Teaching
Kirsty contributes substantially to ScotGEM curriculum planning and development. She provides teaching to ScotGEM educators and students in all years.
She supervises 9 undergraduate student portfolios and multiple Masters students with a range of interests.