A New Way to Evaluate Postdoctoral Dental Applicants: Pass/Fail NBDE Part I
By Alexandra Best, Florida '14
Roughly 15 applications exist for each spot in postdoctoral dental programs, with specialties like oral and maxillofacial surgery as high as 36 to 1. The number of applications has risen 10 percent since 2004. Enrollment rose just 6 percent since 2004 and nearly half of the graduating 2009 class reported applying to an advanced education program. The decision to make the National Board Dental Examination Part I a pass/fail exam in 2012 left many to wonder how advanced education programs plan to choose their residents. In the past, NBDE Part I scores, grade point average and class rank often determined who got an interview.
The Joint Commission on National Dental Examinations ( JCNDE) stated "there is little measurement error at the minimum passing point [a score of 75], but the error increases slightly as the scores depart from that point. For example, there is no guarantee that there is a difference in the knowledge and ability of the candidate who achieves an 89 and the candidate who achieves a 90."2 GPA is hard to compare between schools and some do not give letter grades or class rank. When the American Dental Education Association (ADEA) surveyed postdoctoral program directors in 2010, it asked them to identify qualities they valued in applicants. Intangibles like being a team player, assuming responsibility and integrity ranked higher than cognitive factors — another blow to current methods of postgraduate assessment.
As a result, students applying to postgraduate programs will be required to submit with their ADEA PASS application a Personal Potential Index (PPI). ' The PPI is "a web-based evaluation system designed to provide a more complete picture of an applicant's potential for success in an advanced dental education program—beyond grades, test scores and recommendation letters."3 Applicants choose up to five evaluators to rate them on six personal attributes: knowledge and creativity, communication skills, teamwork, resilience, planning and organization, and ethics and integrity. ' The resulting information is considered more reliable than the optional professional evaluations because it is standardized and incorporates responses from several evaluators, not just one.
To address the concern that a pass/fail NBDE might jeopardize the postdoctoral application process, the ADEA Leadership Institute proposed a National Postdoctoral Dental Qualifying Examination (NPDQE). This exam would measure cognitive qualities currently measured by the NBDE Part I and Part II, plus noncognitive and personality traits. 'The theoretical test would support the idea described by Daniel Goleman in "Emotional Intelligence"—namely, that "emotional intelligence, de– ned as self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and the ability to manage relationships, can matter more than IQ."4 In conjunction with the PPI, it would allow advanced dental program directors to assess applicants' traits that are hard to assess or poorly assessed during interviews and in recommendation letters. ' The group that developed criteria for the NPDQE believes it would be more effective than allowing specialty-specific assessments like the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), which would raise applicant costs and fail to fulfilll the non-cognitive evaluation component.
The 2009 ADA House of Delegates passed Resolution 56H-2009 to create a task force to evaluate a potential Advanced Dental Admission Test. ' The task force so far has sent a survey to postgraduate program directors about whether they would use the new test and what the test should cover. Qualities such as "ability to interpret data, clinical knowledge, clinical judgment, clinical thinking skills including problem solving and ethical reasoning" in addition to basic science knowledge were rated as most important.5 However, there was no consensus on speci–fic content, particularly with 11 characteristics ranking higher than basic science knowledge. The task force still needs to research and discuss content, costs, scoring, feedback and other such issues before any new test is put into practice.
For aspiring specialists, the switch to a pass/fail NBDE will make non-cognitive personal dimensions more important. Using the PPI and possibly a national postdoctoral entrance exam, program directors hope to boost their abilities to identify applicants who will be most successful in their specialty. And with these new forms of evaluation, the best candidates may not be those with the highest IQ, but those who are well-rounded, personable and caring, in addition to clinically and scienti–fically competent. Whether the new forms of evaluation work well remains to be seen, but hopes are high in the dental community.
