Carol Parker, PhD, MPH

Assistant Professor

Carol Parker is the associate dean for administration responsible for the College of Human Medicine's strategic plan, dean’s initiatives, human resources, operations, facilities, and IT. She is also the interim designated institutional official for college-sponsored graduate medical education programs. Dr. Parker joined the College of Human Medicine in 2005 and in addition to her current roles, has directed the Lansing area graduate medical education consortium, a statewide health information exchange and was the executive director for academic affairs. In addition, Dr. Parker has served in several interim roles at the college's request including director of the MPH program, CEO of Flint Area Medical Education corporation, and community assistant dean in Flint and Lansing.

Dr. Parker has a diverse background including assessing student progress, health professions workforce policy, patient safety training for medical residents, stroke quality metrics, and health information exchange organizations and their role in clinical research including the ability to inform transitions of care for stroke patients.

Throughout her career, Dr. Parker has worked to increase training opportunities for health professionals in medically underserved communities. Dr. Parker's areas of interest include program evaluation, curricular continuous quality improvement efforts, assessment methodologies/implementation and interventions to reduce the impact of unconscious bias on access to care and health outcomes.

Select Publications

Chang, Chi, Laird-Fick, Heather, Mitchell, John, Parker, Carol and Solomon, David. Assessing the impact of clerkships on the growth of clinical knowledge. Annals of Medicine. 2024

Sousa, A., Mavis, B., Laird-Fick, H., DeMuth, R., Gold, J., Emery, M., Ferenchick, G., Paganini, A., Colon-Berlingeri, M., Arvidson, C., Toriello, H., Parker, C., Malinowski, R., Han, C., Wagner, D. (2023). Learning by doing and creation of the shared discovery curriculum. Medical Education Online

Chang, C., Parker, C., Malinowski, R., Laird-Fick, H. S., & Gold J. (2022). Evaluation of the peer comments for small group discussion in curriculum with virtual and in-person settings using latent space social network models. Academic Medicine, RIME supplement.

Wang L, Laird-Fick H, Parker C, Solomon D. (2022) Growth in Basic Science Knowledge in first-year medical school and USMLE Step 1 Results: A Longitudinal Investigation at One School. Advances in Health Sciences Education.

Wang L, Laird-Fick HS, Parker CJ, Solomon D. (2021) Using Markov chain model to evaluate medical students' trajectory on progress tests and predict USMLE step 1 scores---a retrospective cohort study in one medical school. BMC Med Educ. 21(1):200. doi: 10.1186/s12909-021-02633-8.

Chang, C., Colón-Berlingeri*, M., Mavis, B., Laird-Fick, H. S., Parker, C., & Solomon, D. (2021). Medical student progress examination performance and its relationship with metacognition, critical thinking, and self-regulated learning strategies. Academic Medicine. 96(2), 278-284 doi: 10.1097/ACM.0000000000003766. *Co-first authors, alphabetically ordered.

Laird-Fick H, Chang C, Wang L, Parker C, Malinowski R, Emery M, Solomon D. Assessing the growth in clinical skills using a progress clinical skills examination. PeerJ. (2020) 8:e9091.

Laird-Fick H, Solomon D, Parker C, Wang L. Attendance, engagement and performance in a medical school curriculum: early findings from competency-based progress testing in a new medical school curriculum. PeerJ. (2018) 6:e5283.

Parker C, Reeves M, Weiner M, Adler-Milstein J. Health Information Exchange Organizations and Their Support for Research: Current State and Future Outlook. INQUIRY: The Journal of Health Care Organization, Provision and Financing. (2017) 54:1-8.

Parker C, Weiner M, Reeves M. Health Information Exchanges - Unfulfilled Promise as a Data Source for Clinical Research. International Journal of Medical Informatics. (2016) 87: 1-9.

Wagner, D., Hoppe, R., Parker, C. The Definitive Guide to the OSCE: The Objective Structured Clinical Examination as a performance assessment. Case Study: Postgraduate Year 1 – Patient Safety OSCE. Harden, Lilley and Patricio, Elsevier Publishing. September 2015. Pages 302-305.

Parker C, Schwamm LH, Fonarow GC, Smith EE, Reeves MJ. Stroke Quality Metrics: Systematic Reviews of the Relationships to Patient-Center Outcomes and Impact of Public Reporting. Stroke. October 2011.

Wagner D, Parke C, Mavis B, Smith MK. An Interdisciplinary Infection Control Education Intervention: Necessary but not Sufficient. Journal of Graduate Medical Education. June 2011. 3(2): 203–210.

Reeves, Mathew; Parker, Carol; Fonarow, Gregg; Smith, Eric; and Schwamm, Lee. Development of Stroke Performance Measures: Definitions, Methods, and Current Measures. Stroke. July 2010.

Wagner, Dianne P., Hoppe, Ruth B, Parker Lee, Carol. A Patient Safety OSCE for PGY-1 Residents – A Centralized Response to the Challenge of Culture Change. Teaching & Learning in Medicine, Springfield, Illinois, January 2009.

Professional Experience/Expertise

University Committee on Academic Governance (UCAG) - 2026-Present

MSU Medicine Implementation Steering Committee - 2026-Present

College Student Learning Environment Committee (LCME 3.6) - 2024-Present

AAMC GIP Strategic Planning Committee - 2023-Present

Dean’s Support Staff Advisory Committee (ex-officio) - 2023-Present

College Advisory Council (CAC) for the College of Human Medicine - 2021 – Present

Ex-officio (22-Present)

Secretary (21-22)

College Strategic Planning Initiative - 2021-Present

Steering Committee (member)

Student Success Subcommittee (ex-officio)

Staff & Faculty Success Subcommittee (ex-officio)

Research & Scholarship Subcommittee (ex-officio)

Healthy Communities Subcommittee (ex-officio)

College LCME Continuous Quality Improvement Committee - 2019-Present

Carol Parker, PhD, MPH

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Education

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