Internal Consistency of Academic Scores as an Index of the Validity of Course Exams: a study in Faculty of Pharmacy Kerman University of Medical Sciences

Adhami, Ashraf; Haghdoost, Ali Akbar; Khazaeli, Payam; Afzali, Marhamat

Internal Consistency of Academic Scores as an Index of the Validity of Course Exams: a study in Faculty of Pharmacy Kerman University of Medical Sciences

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

Ashraf Adhami ¹

Ali Akbar Haghdoost ²

Payam Khazaeli ³

Marhamat Afzali ⁴

¹ M.Sc. in Educational Management, Instructor of General Education Dept., School of Medicine, Physiology Research Center, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Iran.

² Ph.D. In Epidemiology & Biostatics, Associate Professor of Epidemiology and Statistics Dept., Modeling in Health Research Center, School of Health, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Iran

³ Ph.D. in Pharmaceutics, Associate Professor of Pharmaceutics Dept., Pharmacy School, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Iran.

⁴ Expert in Educational Affair, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Iran.

Abstract

Background & Objectives: In order to improve the quality of teaching attention to the students academic progress is important In the present study the internal consistency of students scores has been used as an index for the evaluation of the validity of course exams Methods: All scores of Pharmacy students graduated in 2007 and 2008 were collected from the of Kerman University of Medical Sciences We computed the Pearson correlation coefficient (r) between course scores and grade point average (GPA) In addition coefficients between the mean score in subgroups of courses with GPA were computed Results : In most courses the correlation coefficient between the course score and GPA was in the range of 04 to 06 The lowest correlation coefficients belonged to sport course (004) and thesis (033) while the highest were for theoretical biochemistry (078) and practical chemistry (076) The correlation coefficient of male students scores was 049 and that of female students was 040 that shows significant difference (p < 001) In whole the scores of basic courses showed higher correlation compared to general and special courses The correlations in theoretical and practical courses were equal Conclusion: It seems that this convenient method for investigating the internal consistency of course scores can be used as an index for validity of corse scores Significant difference in correlation coefficients among different courses requires special attention to some courses for investigating the probable testing errors even though in most courses the coefficients were in the acceptable range

Keywords

validation of assessment

Examination

Internal consistency

Quality of Education

Pharmacy

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