Keywords :
Blueprint, Community medicine, Evaluation, Undergraduates, Validity
Citation Information :
Nagaraj K, Prithviraj R, Maheswaran R. Retrospective Descriptive Analysis of a University Undergraduate Community Medicine Question Papers, Karnataka. J Postgrad Med Edu Res 2018; 52 (3):105-109.
Introduction: Summative assessment of students is done to know whether the student is competent enough for certification. As all assessment methods have some intrinsic flaws, solutions need to be identified to reduce these flaws before implementation.
Aim: To evaluate the validity of content in the university undergraduate community medicine question papers and suggest a blueprint format to be used in designing community medicine question paper.
Materials and methods: It is a retrospective descriptive analysis. Undergraduate community medicine theory question papers (papers I and II) of the last nine years, from 2008 to 2016, of a selected university in Karnataka were analyzed for content coverage, weightage, etc. Data are expressed as frequency, percentages, median, and interquartile range.
Results: Analysis of the question papers revealed that in majority of the papers, there was good coverage of all the chapters. Majority (57.6%) of the questions assessed knowledge followed by comprehension (33.1%), application skills (9%), and only 0.3% questions assessed analysis skills. Majority of the marks were from questions of must-know topics.
Conclusion: The present study establishes the scope for improvement while designing question papers in community medicine examinations. Also, blueprint should be an integral part of assessment.
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