People & Lab Culture

Dr. Vidhi Thakkar

Health Services and Policy Research

Dr. Thakkar is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Business Management and Faculty of Arts Science and Technology at UCW. She holds a PhD in Health Services and Policy Research, MSc from McGill University and BHSc from McMaster University.  She completed her Post-Doctoral Training at the University of Victoria as a part of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Health Systems Impact Post-Doctoral Training program, a national competitive scholarship that she won to lead a program evaluation for the Victoria Hospice. She serves as a peer reviewer for the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and has experience leading similar multi-methods research projects and has led several grants with CIHR and worked a Consultant with the World Health Organization for a rapid systematic review and as a Senior Analyst with the BC Ministry of Health, where she led policy briefing notes and cost-effectiveness analyses to support evidence informed decision-making for drug funding. She also is an award winning Educator, she has won the Innovator in Education Award from McMaster University and the McMaster Alumni Award for a positive community impact. Dr. Thakkar teaches courses in Project Management and supervises MBAR 661 students. She has led a scoping review and qualitative interviews on best practices in project management. Dr. Thakkar has done research in the area of CIHR Physical and Mental Health Interventions for equity-seeking populations and here is the report. She has also won the Gordon Cressy Leadership Award at the University of Toronto for creating the Health Policy Forum. 

Dr. Sandra Song

Public Policy and Health Services

Dr. Sandra Song is the Dean of the Faculty of Arts Science and Technology. She has a PhD in Sociology from the University of Alberta and a MA in Sociology from Concordia University. Sandra has extensive experience as a distinguished academic leader in creating and operationalizing new faculties, leading program development and quality assurance. She has a proven track record of faculty staffing, building strategic partnerships and academic governance as well as securing funding and promoting interdisciplinary collaboration. She has also worked as a Senior Policy Analyst with Health Canada on similar projects leading a multi-sector working group with 25 members, managing competing perspectives, and delivering policy options for senior leaders. As a Senior Policy Analyst with the Government of Canada, she managed a horizontal network of 14 federal organizations, producing a $50 million framework: A Canada for All: Canada's Action Plan Against Racism, ensuring strategic alignment and impactful outcomes. Dr. Song was recognized with a departmental award for delivering excellence and impact, and demonstrating commitment to high standards and effective project management.  She has secured significant funding and fostered interdisciplinary collaboration, contributing to the successful implementation of national initiatives. She will support the team in building federal level partnerships and seeking funding for this interdisciplinary initiative. 

Dr. Raaj Tiagi

Health Economics

Dr. Raaj Tiagi has a PhD in Health Economics from UC Irvine and brings demonstrated expertise in health policy and health systems analysis, with a focus on primary care, health system financing and service delivery models. He has worked as a Senior Health Economist with Doctors of BC, and has strong quantitative and applied research skills, including regression modeling, survey analysis and the use of population-level and administrative datasets to support costing, utilization monitoring, and budget impact analysis. His work emphasizes methodological rigor, transparency and the clear articulation of limitations to support policy-relevant research. Dr. Tiagi is skilled in translating complex evidence into accessible policy briefs, briefing notes, and summaries tailored to decision-makers and non-academic audiences. His work is grounded in an equity and ethics-informed approach, with a strong commitment to public interest research, accountability and evidence-informed policymaking. 

Dr. Mustafa Ornek

Project Management and Engineering

Dr. Mustafa Ornek has a PhD on Health Policy with specialization in Health Economics. During his studies, he has worked as a teaching assistant for Dr. John Lavis, on his Health Systems and Health Policy course. Dr. Lavis is also the director of McMaster Health Forum, an exemplary health policy lab that focuses on knowledge translation. While closely working with Dr. Lavis, he was exposed to activities of the McMaster Health Forum and its administration. After his studies, he worked at Statistics Canada as a Research Data Centre Analyst, which equipped him with vast knowledge about the data landscape in Canada and especially in terms of health data. At this role, he has helped six PhD students in their research using quantitative research by providing guidance on working with statistical datasets. Between May 2021 and May 2022, he worked as a policy analyst at Health Canada's COVID-19 Task Force. In that position, he has worked in various dashboards, weekly presentation decks, rapid-response reports and policy briefs for the Ministry of Health to be used and presented at the Parliament. His research interests include healthcare costs, health outcomes and their intersection with immigration and poverty. 

Dr. Ali Khazraei

Project Management

Dr. Ali Khazraei has a PhD P.Eng, MBA PMP, PMI-RMP and LEED AP. He has extensive experience leading and contributing to applied, quantitative and interdisciplinary research projects across engineering, business, and management domains. He has managed and participated in competitively funded research initiatives, including an NSERC doctoral grant, a Mitacs and a CRITM postdoctoral fellowship, with a strong emphasis on data-driven analysis, modeling and real-world problem solving. He has also served as a project and product manager across multiple industries, including oil and gas, environmental systems, EHS, logistics, aerospace and manufacturing, with a proven track record of delivering complex, cross-functional initiatives. In academia, he has served as course lead for Project Management and its electives at UCW and has taught a wide range of courses—such as Operations Management, Business Technology Management, and Quantitative Methods—at institutions including Concordia University, McGill University and UCW. His work bridges academic research and industry practice, informed by his background as a professional engineer, with a strong focus on rigorous methodology, practical impact, and building student research capacity.

Dr. Amirhossein Zaji

Artificial Intelligence

Dr. Amirhossein Zaji is an Associate Professor at University Canada West whose work centres on applying artificial intelligence and data-driven modelling to real-world problems. He holds two doctoral degrees, each applying machine learning and deep learning to a different field. His first doctorate focused on water resources and environmental engineering, developing AI-based models to forecast river discharge, flood levels, and sediment behaviour from satellite and sensor data. His second doctorate, completed at the University of British Columbia, applied deep learning and computer vision to precision agriculture, building high-throughput phenotyping systems to monitor, count and measure crops in the field. 

His research spans: 

• Time series forecasting
• Remote sensing and satellite data processing
• Evolutionary optimization
• Large language models applied to education and business

He is an active contributor to scholarship on AI-resilient assessment and the responsible use of generative AI in the classroom, and is the author of more than 70 peer-reviewed publications in leading international journals. 

Dr. Sherry Abdellatif

Public Policy

Dr. Sherry Abdellatif is an Associate Professor in the Department of Quantitative Studies with over seven years of academic and industry experience in the public and private sectors. She has extensive experience teaching and supervising MBAR students at UCW. She also brings extensive international and local experience in: Policymaking, Regulations Compliance and Governance. Her focus is spanning academic research, senior government advisory roles, and global policy engagement. Her work focuses on the intersection of: Sustainability, Finance, Ethics and Governance Regulatory alignment to advance the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). She has served as Senior Advisor overseeing health policy insurance regulations and has advised ministers, regulators and senior public-sector leaders on policy development, regulations and regulatory oversight across multiple jurisdictions.

Dr. Mohsen Ghodrat

Computer Science

Dr. Mohsen Ghodrat holds a PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering is a highly accomplished engineer and scholar in the field of: Control Systems, Machine Learning, and Natural Language Processing.  He received his Bachelor of Science (BSc) and Master of Science (MSc) degrees in Mechanical Engineering from Shiraz University in Iran in 2004 and 2008, respectively. Dr. Ghodrat continued his academic pursuits, ultimately earning his Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree in Electrical Computer Engineering from the University of Alberta in 2018. After earning his PhD, Dr. Ghodrat pursued his research career as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Alberta's Department of Electrical Engineering from 2019 to 2021. During this time, he focused on developing optimization and control algorithms for large-scale Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) applications. 

Dr. Amit Kohli

Digital Transformation and Applied Artificial Intelligence

Dr. Amit Kohli is an Associate Professor at University Canada West. He completed post-doctoral research at the University of Arizona, USA, and served as a Visiting Researcher at the University of Calgary, Canada. He holds a PhD along with two master's degrees in Industrial Engineering and Administrative Sciences. He is a Project Management Professional (PMP) and an ASCM Certified Supply Chain Professional (CSCP).

Dr. Kohli brings more than 20 years of combined academic and industry experience in digital transformation, supply chain systems and technology-enabled business innovation. He has successfully completed consultancy projects for organizations in the areas of digital transformation, supply chain optimization, AI adoption and technology implementation.