Abstract
Introduction: Iranian universities of medical sciences are ranking by the results of biannual Pre- Internship and Basic Sciences Comprehensive Exams (PICE and BSCE). The present study was conducted to determine the agreement rate of these two exams as an index for ranking Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences (KUMS) amongst other universities.
Materials and Methods: In this descriptive-analytical study, KUMS ranking results were surveyed in 20 PICE and 25 BSCE periods during 1990–2002 by determining percentage ranking and median grade as a cut-off point. Kappa Agreement Coefficients (KAC) in two cases (contemporaneous and 3-year intervals) was calculated. This coefficient was separately calculated for "exam month performance" (September and February) and "number of participants" (<50 and ≥50).
Results: Kappa agreement coefficient for two exams in all periods for the first case (contemporaneous) was 0.20, compared to 0.05 for the second case (3-year intervals between two exams). KAC in each of the cases was calculated for four sub-groups (September, February, <50 and ≥50 students). Only in the first case (<50 students sub-group) it was statistically significant (p=0.004).
Conclusion: In this study the agreement rate between PICE and BSCE for two different cases was calculated. In both cases KAC was very low, showing no valuable agreementbetween the two mentioned exams in their assessment of KUMS ranking amongst other universities. This means that each exam evaluates two different aspects of university ranking. Regarding the high KAC in two exams in the "<50 students" sub-group it seems that the special characteristics of students who could not pass their courses on time and thus could not participate in routine comprehensive exams led to this result.
Keywords
Comprehensive Exam University Ranking Basic Sciences Pre Internship Kermanshah
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© 2005, Journal of Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences. This open-access article is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 (CC BY-NC 4.0) International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which allows for the copying and redistribution of the material only for noncommercial purposes, provided that the original work is properly cited.