Introduction

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, most universities in North America transitioned to online instruction and assessment in March 2020. Undergraduate pharmacy students in years one to three of two four-year entry-to-practice programs at a university in Canada were administered open-book examinations to complete their didactic winter-term courses in pharmaceutical sciences; behavioural, social, and administrative sciences; and pharmacotherapeutics. The impacts of the switch to open-book examinations on final exam characteristics are examined.

Methods

The ratios and correlations of final exam and midterm grades in 2020, where final exams were open-book, and in 2019, where finals were closed-book, were calculated and compared.

Results

In 2020, the ratio of final exam to midterm exam scores for five out of seven courses were significantly larger than they were in 2019. Alternatively, for all but one course, the correlations between midterm and final examination grades showed no significant difference from 2019 to 2020.

Conclusions

Compared to 2019 when finals were administered in a closed-book format, a sudden shift to an open-book format for final exams in 2020 appears to be associated with the final exams becoming easier relative to midterms. However, when considering how final and midterm exam grades correlate year over year, in all but one class, there was no significant difference. These findings suggest that changing exams to be open-book may change how they can be used to inform criterion-referenced or absolute grading decisions but not norm-referenced or rank-based decisions.

中文翻译：

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测试形式从闭卷到开卷的突然转变是否会改变总结性期末考试的考试成绩特征？

介绍

为应对 COVID-19 大流行，北美大多数大学于 2020 年 3 月过渡到在线教学和评估。加拿大一所大学的两个四年制入门实践课程中的第一年至第三年的本科药学学生接受了管理开卷考试，以完成他们的药学冬季教学课程；行为、社会和行政科学；和药物治疗学。研究了改用开卷考试对期末考试特征的影响。

方法

计算并比较了 2020 年期末考试为开卷和 2019 年期末考试为闭卷的期末考试和期中成绩的比率和相关性。

结果

2020 年，7 门课程中有 5 门的期中考试成绩与期中考试成绩的比率明显高于 2019 年。或者，除一门课程外，其他所有课程的期中考试成绩与期中考试成绩之间的相关性与 2019 年至 2019 年相比没有显着差异2020.

结论

与 2019 年以闭卷形式进行期末考试相比，2020 年突然转向开卷形式的期末考试似乎与期末考试相对于期中考试变得更容易有关。然而，考虑到期末考试成绩和期中考试成绩逐年相关，除了一个班级之外，其他班级没有显着差异。这些发现表明，将考试改为开卷考试可能会改变它们如何用于为标准参考或绝对评分决定提供信息，但不会改变常模参考或基于排名的决定。