Erasmus + grant received for implementing Online International Adaptive Progress Testing

Start of the Erasmus+ project: Developing the Online Adaptive International Progress Test

A consortium of EBMA members, spread throughout Europe, have received a grant from Erasmus + to implement an Online Adaptive International Progress Test (OAIPT). This will be a collaborative test for medical schools across Europe to allow measurement of deep, long-lasting meaningful learning as well as early detection and remediation of underperforming students.

The development of the OAIPT is a collaboration among 8 EBMA members: University Medical Centre Groningen, University of Minho, University of Exeter, University of Plymouth, Medical University Lodz, Jagiellonian University, University of Helsinki, coordinated by Maastricht University.

The first period of this three-year project will consist of the development of the item bank, review procedures and infrastructure. To ensure cross-country overlap of item development, teachers and faculty staff members of all eight universities will participate in short-term joint staff training events, in which they will be trained in item writing and reviewing, and furthermore in analyzing the data generated via the outcome of this project. This will result in well-trained teachers and medical experts who can produce high-quality level items for the future.

The first transnational project meeting was organized in Maastricht on October 5^th, where the blueprint has been developed and all project matters have been discussed. We are looking forward in the next 3 years working together with an enthusiastic European project team!

We will keep you updated about the progress of this project through the newsletter.

Project summary

In Europe, there are major differences between the quality of assessment of medical education. Due to different assessment methods and standards it is currently not possible to assure the quality of undergraduate medicine programmes across Europe. When looking at mobility of medical students and professionals, this is problematic and can constitute a danger for patients and the public.

To stay on top of quality levels and European standards and to make sure that their students have the appropriate level of knowledge to work across Europe, medical schools are increasingly looking for cooperation to ensure the quality of their medical education and assessment methods. This can be enhanced by implementing

Progress Testing, as it allows measurement of deep, long-lasting meaningful learning as well as early detection and remediation of underperforming students. For this reason, this project aims at developing an OAIPT. OAIPT will be an online adaptive test for medical schools across Europe that reflects the entire domain of medical

knowledge.The OAIPT will be developed by 8 medical schools across Europe, and will be tested and validated in a large-scale pilot-study. Cooperation will be sought with other stakeholders (students, policy makers, quality assessors) to ensure the OAIPT meets their needs and objectives and to make sure it will be disseminated to a large audience from an early stage.

In the creation of the OAIPT, the following intellectual outputs will be developed:

IO 1 Item bank

IO 2 Infrastructure

IO 3 Evaluation of the pilot study of OAIPT

IO 4 Documents on transferability

In addition to the intellectual outputs, partners will organise short-term joint staff training events and one Multiplier Event, to complement and reinforce the intellectual outputs. Teachers and faculty staff members will be trained in item writing, reviewing and in analysing the data generated via the OAIPT for policy makers and quality

assurance personnel can draw conclusions based on it. At the end of the project period, a multiplier event will be organised to disseminate the project results. Focus of this event will be on the transferability and use of the OAIPT by other medical schools across Europe.

The OAIPT will help determine European standards for assessing quality of student’s performance regarding medical knowledge and provides medical schools with the ability to benchmark results of student’s performance among partnering medical schools. The OAIPT provides students with a European recognition of their

qualifications by which their mobility and career opportunities increase and in the long run, it enhances the quality level of medical students and professionals across Europe and thus enhancing the quality level of healthcare across Europe.