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The Big Short.., The New MCAT Dilemma
We are all aware of the recent AAMC accommodations for year 2020-2021 application cycle to medical schools during the Covid-19 pandemic including the modified MCAT test that is planned to be administered 63 times between May 29 and September 28, 2020.
That is simply said, is equal to more than two years of testing normally done by the AAMC, getting finished in less than 4 months!!
Despite the new test is 38 questions slimmer and 66 minutes shorter, it’s still significantly longer than prior to 2015 old MCAT test, and AAMC still claims that it will be equal to the current standard MCAT test in terms of academic weigh and scoring reliability.
They claim that they have accomplished this by cutting administrative time and by removing the so called field “discrete” questions that is usually used in the standardization of any exam.
I don’t believe AMCAS is inserting close to 19% of the questions as psychometric statistical questions in any standard version of the test, there must be some of the meat and bone parts of the original test which got trimmed along the way to come up with this new shortened version.
And even if the AAMC did remove some of these trial questions, that will only render the new test to be less reliable statistically from other prior given tests!
We know the MCAT test is normalized rather than curved in order to keep a reliable statistical reproducibility to satisfy the needs of medical schools for “equalizing ruler” to measure their future students across large pool of applicants over the years.
If this new device is made hastily out of the need to accommodate a large number of disadvantaged applicants due to Covid-19 pandemic, then the AAMC ought to:
- Exclude this cohort of short tests from the lager pool used for the purpose of standardization of the test in general.
⁃ Try to create enough test contents to allow adequate variability in this 2020 heavy testing summer season.
⁃ Disallow test retakes and make it as “once in lifetime” policy to take this short version test in order to maintain the integrity of the test.
⁃ Allow an adjustment factor into the performance variance between the different administration times of the day.
⁃ Institute a reliable recalibration measures before the expedited release of these scores.
⁃ Use this as a pilot study for future online 360 proctored exam with less breaks and disruption in the post Covid-19 era.
I believe if the AAMC succeed in carrying out this trial run successfully, it might be able to bridge over its current testing MCAT methodology to the new format of professional testing in the future.
We are all aware of the recent AAMC accommodations for year 2020-2021 application cycle to medical schools during the Covid-19 pandemic including the modified MCAT test that is planned to be administered 63 times between May 29 and September 28, 2020.
That is simply said, is equal to more than two years of testing normally done by the AAMC, getting finished in less than 4 months!!
Despite the new test is 38 questions slimmer and 66 minutes shorter, it’s still significantly longer than prior to 2015 old MCAT test, and AAMC still claims that it will be equal to the current standard MCAT test in terms of academic weigh and scoring reliability.
They claim that they have accomplished this by cutting administrative time and by removing the so called field “discrete” questions that is usually used in the standardization of any exam.
I don’t believe AMCAS is inserting close to 19% of the questions as psychometric statistical questions in any standard version of the test, there must be some of the meat and bone parts of the original test which got trimmed along the way to come up with this new shortened version.
And even if the AAMC did remove some of these trial questions, that will only render the new test to be less reliable statistically from other prior given tests!
We know the MCAT test is normalized rather than curved in order to keep a reliable statistical reproducibility to satisfy the needs of medical schools for “equalizing ruler” to measure their future students across large pool of applicants over the years.
If this new device is made hastily out of the need to accommodate a large number of disadvantaged applicants due to Covid-19 pandemic, then the AAMC ought to:
- Exclude this cohort of short tests from the lager pool used for the purpose of standardization of the test in general.
⁃ Try to create enough test contents to allow adequate variability in this 2020 heavy testing summer season.
⁃ Disallow test retakes and make it as “once in lifetime” policy to take this short version test in order to maintain the integrity of the test.
⁃ Allow an adjustment factor into the performance variance between the different administration times of the day.
⁃ Institute a reliable recalibration measures before the expedited release of these scores.
⁃ Use this as a pilot study for future online 360 proctored exam with less breaks and disruption in the post Covid-19 era.
I believe if the AAMC succeed in carrying out this trial run successfully, it might be able to bridge over its current testing MCAT methodology to the new format of professional testing in the future.
