Med schools offer "Supplemental Exams" to those...

[Guest uptownyeung]

who didn't pass? I was just wondering if that is a common practice across Canada (a strictly Canadian/British phenomenon?)...A friend of mine in the States is having to repeat Gross anatomy this summer (which he just failed), but I'm aware that in Canada there are at least a handful of schools that are giving their students the option of re-writing the exam if they were only a few marks short...any ideas? or maybe they all do??

[Guest moo]

At my school in the US, we have sequential exams throughout first and second year. Units (by system) are 4-6 weeks long with an exam at the end. There are six exams in first year, seven in second year. Fail three in either year, you're done for the year but the school will let you come back and repeat again and will pay for 3/4 of your tuition. Fail one or two, you can retake. Passing is 70% or two SDs below the mean, whichever is lower. If you fail, you must get above 1.5 SDs below the mean on your retake. I am guessing most med schools nowadays are like this (without the curve... I think my school is the exception), as it is very rare for people to fail out. (People may drop out for various reasons, but failing out is very rare.) However, I do know someone at Vanderbilt, and there, it's a lot stricter. Passing is 80% and they make you remediate the whole class if you fail.

[Guest uptownyeung]

80%?! no kidding that's lots. anyways..do they make a notation on your transcript that you failed then passed or they let people off easy? hmm

[Guest moo]

No as long as you pass the remedial exam, you pass the year. However, if your cumulative exam score is less than 1.5 SDs below the mean, then you get a Low Pass. Otherwise you get a Pass. My friend at Vandy failed pathology just barely. He will have to remediate the course.

[Guest Kirsteen]

Hi there,

 

A person I know who is graduating from UofT's MD program this year had a bit of "trouble" in first and second year. Consequently, she had a number of supplemental pieces of work to do in order to move to the next school year. I'm not sure if any of them were exams, but she certainly had a number of extra assignments and/or essays to complete to pass some modules.

 

Cheers,

Kirsteen

[Guest Sarah371]

Queen's offers a supplemental exam to those who don't pass a phase (which is one semester). As far as I know there is no record of you having to write a supplemental if you pass it. If you don't pass the sup exam you are required to repeat the phase. If you fail again I believe that you may be asked to reconsider your career choice.

 

Clerkship works much the same way but I think that all departments may offer different options like rewriting a block exam (eg. internal medicine) or some sort of extra work, papers etc.

 

SARAH