Different Examination Method Under Pharmacy School In Nigeria

Every semester in pharmacy school lasts for four months. This four months period is divided into teaching and examination. The teaching is for a period of three months while the examination takes the other one month. Teaching can be based on theory or experimental practical classes. The examination is also for both the theory class and the experimental practical classes. The examination for theory experimental practical classes has been discussed before in this blog. Today, we shall see how the examination is done in pharmacy.

The examination in pharmacy starts from Continuous Assessment (C.A). Lecturers can use different methods in assessing students. These include class attendance, assignment, group presentation or assignment and a test or in some cases a combination of some of these methods.

Continuous Assessment (C.A) In Pharmacy School

Class Attendance

In the class, students put down their names and matriculation number every time they attend the lecturers class. The list is submitted at the end of the lecture to the lecturer. Late comers may not be allowed to write their names. The final score is calculated based on the number of lectures attended by the student.

Assignment

This is the most common method of all. The lecturer asks or set a question for them. They are to provide the answer either typed or hand written. At the end, it must be submitted to the lecturer directly or through the class coordinator. In rare cases, the assignment can be by a group.

Group Presentation

Some lecturers can ask for a seminar presentation from the students. In most cases, it is in-group. However, it is not out of place for an individual presentation.

Test

The lecturer that wants to use a test method schedule a particular date for it. The test questions will cover everything the lecturer have taught before that day. In other cases, a lecturer may decide to set the test after completing the teaching of the course content. In most times, the test is simply essay or short short answers methods which is explained below.

Pharmacy school Assessment

The score is graded by the lecturer and added to the students final score in examination. Test scores by each lecturer varies depending on the course load by that lecturer since most courses are handled by more than one lecturer. Total test scores from all the lecturers for one course is 30 %.

Weeks or months before the commencement of the examination, the examination officer will arrange the examination timetable for the whole faculty. This will be posted online or on the faculty notice board. It is expected that all students must abide by it.

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All lecturers are expected to finish their curriculum before the commencement of the examination. Before the beginning of the examinations, all lecturers will submit the questions they set based on what they lectured to the Head Of Department (H.O.D). The HOD has the power to adjust, modify, or even edit each question to suit the question style of the department. However, where a professor set a question and the HOD is not a professor, very hardly will such questions experience such alterations.

Examination Formats In Pharmacy

Pharmacy Examinations type

All pharmacy examinations fall into several categories. They are:

• Multiple-choice questions (M.C.Q)
• Short answer questions
• Essay type questions
• Completion type questions
• Matching type questions

Multiple Type Questions (M.Q.C)

This type of questions consists of a question or an incomplete sentence in combination with a number of possible choices or answers (3 – 5) of which one is considered the correct option. The corrected option must be selected if one wants the score for that question.
Multiple choice questions are further divided into

1. True/False: A sentence to be confirmed by the student if it is true or false
2. One-best-answer: Many options of which one is the best answer with distractors (wrong answers)

Short Answers Questions

This question requires a very short answer to about one or two paragraph. It is usually a definition

Essay Type Question

They require well-structured answers from few paragraphs to pages. It involves applied questions that are not direct but the answer is what has been taught and calculations.

Matching Type Or Completion Type

Matching type is a type of questions popularly called ‘German questions’ is a type whereby an item that provides a defined term and it requires the student to match an identifying characteristic to the correct term.

On the other hand, completion test, which is similar to matching type, makes use of a blank space to be filled by the student. In some cases, there will be an option.

What Pharmacy Students Should Know

The number of questions by each lecturer is never equal. It is calculated by the course load of the lecturer. While a lecturer may set two, another lecturer that also taught that course may set three. The total score of the examination is 70 %. When all the lecturers bring their test CA together, the students final score is graded.

In pharmacy, question type varies from department to department and year to year. A department may adopt various test as the years go by. However, some departments may stick to a particular type as they also use other methods to complement it. For example, pharmacology and therapeutics use an essay type questions all year round. The essay type may use question on the question with the highest score. The rest will have equal marks and they are not as high as the first. Still, they may decide to add any of the other methods.

Before the examination or during studies, it is best to know the question types for each examination. This can be done by asking students who have done it or asking the lecturer, looking at past questions may help only if the questions types are not changed.

An examination has a specific time allocated for it. The HOD into the different questions has divided this. You can time yourself by dividing each question with the total time. This will help in the time spent on each question.

Some MCQ employs the system of negative marking. In this case, a failed question will attract a deduction of a score. When this is not stated, it is better to answer all questions even if the answers are not sure. In that case, use the method of high-density answer whereby the option that appears most will be the one that you will be used to answer the rest.

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All examinations are answered on an answer booklet provided by the school. Student information must be included on the side or first page of the script such as matriculation number. Failure to do this can lead to missing script and score. However, most MCQ answers are answered inside the question paper. In such a case, it is proper to include your matriculation number and other students detail wanted.

Students are required to register courses for the semester with their course adviser. The methods vary from school to school.

Examinations in pharmacy are closed book method and not open book method. The only exceptions are in the laboratory examinations that may allow the use of reference book such as Pharmaceutics and industrial pharmacy laboratory examinations.

Oral examinations are not very common. The only time it is used is during project defense and viva for a clerkship.

MCQ is difficult for the lecturer to set but easy to grade. It is easy for students to some extent but requires the student to read every part of the materials since the questions can be picked from every part of the materials. Students can guess all the answers by using approximation.

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