Order of Nurses of Quebec | Many flaws revealed in entrance exam

The examination for admission to the nursing profession, which ended in September with a disproportionate failure rate, has several flaws, reveals an investigation by the Commissioner for Admission to the Professions. In particular, he questions the quality of the questions and the passing scores “raised without sufficient justification”. More than 500 nurses would have paid the price.

“Our investigation has revealed that the Order’s exam has flaws and weaknesses regarding its validity, reliability and the determination of its pass mark,” said Tuesday the Commissioner for Admission to Professions, Mr.^e Andre Gariepy.

Nearly half of nursing students (48.6%) who took the exam for the first time last September failed the exam. Commissioner André Gariépy had been tasked with investigating the reasons leading to this disproportionate failure rate.

According to a simulation by the commissioner’s investigation team, more than 500 students should have passed rather than failed the September 2022 exam. fall 2022 and contribute to the health network,” wrote the commissioner. He calls for the September 2022 results to be recalculated based on a revised pass mark. A total of 2,904 candidates had presented themselves for the September 2022 exam session.

The Order of Nurses of Quebec (OIIQ) announced on Tuesday that it would take a few days to analyze the report, adding that this delay will not affect the publication of the results of the March 2023 exam. of Health, Christian Dubé, said he wanted to take the time to read the report and talk about it with his colleagues, as well as with the OIIQ. “I will be very clear, we cannot afford to deprive ourselves of 500 nurses,” he said.

The quality of the questions at stake

The survey finds significant problems in the construction of the exam questions. “More than three quarters of the students found that the questions, the situations and the choice of answers were not clear. It was as much among the CEGEP students as the university students,” said The Press M^e Gariepy. Furthermore, the Order is not able to guarantee or demonstrate a comparable level of difficulty between exam sessions, he notes.

The commissioner also finds that the validity of the examination is affected. The documentation usually used to construct the exam and its validity “has not been reviewed for more than a decade”. It is also noted that the Order “does not have a current and proper analysis of the tasks of the profession in hand to guide the development of the examination”.

It also notes a worrying situation for people trained outside Quebec, whose success rate was 15% in September 2022.

The Order invited to improve its examination

Following these observations, the Commissioner invites the Order to question the relevance and usefulness of an examination, to improve its examination by following up on the report’s recommendations or to consider using another relevant examination the nursing profession. “We are also asking to recalculate the marks for September and to consider recalculating March 2021 and March 2022,” said Ms.^e Gariepy.

The exam, which consists of around 100 multiple-choice questions, lasts an entire day. It takes place twice a year, in September and March. Candidates may take the exam a maximum of three times.

In November, the OIIQ explained the high failure rate by the pandemic, in particular by the fact that the students had to juggle with online courses and had an impact on their internships. The Order then maintained that the September exam was designed in the same way as those of recent years.

The Commissioner for Admission to Professions works for equitable and effective access to professions whose exercise is controlled by 46 professional orders in Quebec. He has the power to carry out verifications in the form of an investigation.