Minutes
Evaluation Subcommittee
October 8, 2003

Present: Stair, Ritz, Archer, Hahn, Lee, Romrell, Rarey, Margie

Emergency Medicine:

Technical problems with lecture delivery.
Had problem with shift work
Some students slept
some didn't show up
some went home to sleep and came back
We tried computer-delivered lecture series on 24 hrs day (where they can view them and listen to lectures)
Problem converting HTML files through modems

On test scores:

Students did poorly in toxicology
how are you addressing this, which was not mentioned in report.

Dr. Stair on Toxicology::

Toxicology tends to be a brand new subject
Will get some on other clerkships
Process of accumulating cases that we will be using on the simulator;
Just acquired new offices below the emergency dept where we can run them on the simulator.
Jax has a simulator as well.
AGH students come here for their didactic training.

Asked Jeremy; Was emergency medicine clerkship similar to other clerkships with regard to feedback?

Jeremy:

good feedback but not always high quality feedback
but every shift you get feedback.
Medicine is successful in doing mid-clerkship feedback specific to the competencies.

Dr. Stair: It's a difficult battle to get everyone to do a shift rotation feedback. Dr. Stair's stats said formative mid-clerkship feedback was useful, having a 3.3+ score from students.

Medicine
Has a committee that gives feedback.
On the spot in the ER is difficult to do.
Emergency Medicine does a mandated shift feedback with shift rotation.

Dr. Stair: Jacksonville has some of the most outstanding teachers: Caro, Weir. It is much more resident run and has a abigger range of folks who are teaching oriented as opposed to GNV.

Romrell: you had capability of mass-producing CDs to put course materials on them. Dr. Stair says they have already done that. Difficult is being able to hear lectures on the CDs. They also get a hard copy print out, a cd, and it's on the website. They are powerpoint lectures with audiovoice over.

Dr. Stair on review sessions:

start off with questions from students about reading, lectures, etc.
go into cases; access their thought processing skills
encourage questions.

How do you feel about the grade distribution? Dr. Stair: the predictor was the exam score.

Dr. Rarey asked is the exam questions were secure? Dr. Stair remarked that they are internally generated; students have talked; second period clerkship folks say there is a lot of math on the exam; the mean has apparently increased this year but the clerkship director did not see a dramatic shift.

Dr. Stair was asked if he has identified which ones are core basic knowledge and which ones are competency skills? He states that those questions are a major complaint with the students because they have predominantly been application questions that have been criticized because of the math.

Anesthesiology: Ask Tammy Euliano to come to a meeting for Anesthesiology.

Medicine: Received good scores.
Neurology: Got perfect score on all 4 parameters.
Ob/Gyn: Highly scored, 3.5 was lowest score.
Surgery: Course report was 3.6-3.7; low was syllabus student performance criteria . We may need to talk to Mike Chen about that. The overview section of the surgery syllabus was not organized per the guide. Will ask Mike Chen to address this aspect when we meet with him. It seems the Surgery overview and the subspecialty areas were not designed with objectives and what they needed to do. The format within the subspecialties is quite a diverse. Dr. Romrell reported that there are 20 students that rotate through surgery at one time.

What is the status of Ophthalmology as a subspecialty?

Dr. Romrell says it will probably stay there.
They have to work to improve.
Students don't see as much surgery in Ophthalmology as they wanted to see.

Dr. Rarey announced that the assessment of all course and clerkship reports has been completed at this point. The Evaluation Subcommittee will now report to the Curriculum Committee if there is no further discussion.

Dr. Duerson has seen a better quality of learning objectives over the 4 years we have been doing this. Are the students getting a better education as a result of this committee's work and, if so, what evidence do we have?

Dr. Ritz asked, what are the electives?

Dr. Rarey stated that Dr. Davidson, as chair of the Curriculum Committee, has asked that he call a meeting of the sub-clerkship directors for peds, family medicine, and internal medicine. The plan is to redo the 4th year elective catalog to make sure the electives are competency based. We are starting to focus on the 4th year now.

Dr. Romrell believes that, in general, students are pleased with the 4th year. We do need to add a little structure there. We still need better advisement. We need to use the competency forms to evaluate more critically.

Margie will forward to committee members the email from Cynthia about the electives offered by the college (Margie forwarded Cynthia's email on 10/9/03 to all Evaluation Subcommittee members).

Dr. Ritz and Bill Allen just stated that they do not have learning objectives for their electives. Bill remarked that the form didn't fit his elective. Both Dr. Ritz and Bill Allen were asked to redesign the elective form.

Dr. Rarey announced that there was some discussion about whether the Curriculum Committee is ready to hear recommendations about grade inflation, etc. The committee consists of Margaret Duerson and Bill Allen. There is a timeline. Work should begin this fall to bring out the bring out the strengths and weaknesses of given grades and impact the grade inflation need to shift the attention away from grade inflation to competency scoring. We have to address competency scoring and grade inflation--how do we score out the competency forms?

Dr. Rarey also stated that the Evaluation Subcommittee will hold a retreat in January or February, 2004. After the retreat, the Evaluation Subcommittee will then bring the report to the attention of the Curriculum Committee so that they can make a decision in March or April, 2004 so we are ready to go in July, 2004.

Dr. Ritz volunteered to inquire into other universities to see what they are going about grade inflation. Someone can contact schools about competency assessment. The whole grading system is open up for discussion. At the next meeting, October 22, Dr. Ritz will give a report on grade inflation. (Look for standards of grading in other schools. What is the criteria for grading in other schools?)

Bill Allen commented that assuming we have grades, but do we have a grading policy? Is the Harris report still in effect, or are we going to revise it to include the competency areas as well. Bill suggested that maybe the grade category should correspond to the competency category. Dr. Rarey appointed Bill to check into this possibility and report back to the Evaluation Subcommittee at the next session.

Dr. Romrell stated that the issues Provide guidelines for grade inflation and for assigning scores and competency. Right now, we have to go with the current system that's here.

Meeting adjourned at 12:57.
Margie McGarva recording.