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NBME Customized Assessment Services

The NBME currently provides discipline-based subject examinations in the basic and clinical sciences for the purpose of assessing the educational achievement of individuals in specific subject areas. The current discipline-focus of the subject examination program does not meet the need for most schools due to the increasing trend toward curriculum integration and the school- to-school variation in basic science instruction.

In order to serve the needs for basic science assessment, the NBME is developing the NBME Flexible Blueprinting System to design customized examinations and other assessment services. Using items from the existing basic science subject examination pools, a pool of items that covers the topics commonly taught and tested in basic science coursework are being classified according to item classification systems designed to enable construction of examinations for courses offered in discipline-based, organ-system, and problem-based curricular approaches.

During the demonstration, the authors will exhibit the prototype systems under development at NBME, which have been designed to permit medical school faculty members to log on and assemble a customized examination, to review a computer-generated draft examination, to finalize the items selected for the customized examination, and to define the scores to be reported. The customized examinations will be administered via the web, and scores and detailed item-by-item summaries of school performance will be provided on a secure website.

The prototype for customized examinations will be introduced with a limited number of schools during the 2005-2006 academic year and will be available for all schools during the 2006-2007 academic year.

Questions?  Contact Julie Hewett