RESEARCH LIBRARY

Quality Assurance in Education, Vol. 26 No. 2, pp. 150-152

An introduction to a special issue of Quality Assurance in Education featuring papers based on presentations at a two-day international seminar on managing the quality of data collection in large-scale assessments.

Psychometrika 83, 847–857 (2018)

Utilizing algorithms to generate items in educational and psychological testing is an active area of research for obvious reasons: Test items are predominantly written by humans, in most cases by content experts who represent a limited and potentially costly resource. Using algorithms instead has the appeal to provide an unlimited resource for this crucial part of assessment development.

Journal of Veterinary Medical Education 2018 45:3, 381-387

This study uses item response data from the November–December 2014 and April 2015 NAVLE administrations (n =5,292), to conduct timing analyses comparing performance across several examinee subgroups. The results provide evidence that conditions were sufficient for most examinees, thereby supporting the current time limits. For the relatively few examinees who may have been impacted, results suggest the cause is not a bias with the test but rather the effect of poor pacing behavior combined with knowledge deficits.

Western Journal of Emergency Medicine: Integrating Emergency Care with Population Health, 19(1)

This review is a descriptive summary of the development of National EM M4 examinations, Version 1 (V1) and Version 2 (V2), and the NBME EM Advanced Clinical Examination (ACE) and their relevant usage and performance data. In particular, it describes how examination content was edited to affect desired changes in examination performance data and offers a model for educators seeking to develop their own examinations.

The authors examined the extent to which USMLE scores relate to the odds of receiving a disciplinary action from a U.S. state medical board.

Academic Medicine: Volume 88 - Issue 11 - p 1670-1675

From 2007 through 2012, the NBME team reviewed literature in physician–patient communication, examined performance characteristics of the Step 2 CS exam, observed case development and quality assurance processes, interviewed SPs and their trainers, and reviewed video recordings of examinee–SP interactions.  The authors describe perspectives gained by their team from the review process and outline the resulting enhancements to the Step 2 CS exam, some of which were rolled out in June 2012.