Workshop Facilitators: Dr Shelley Ross, Dr Brent Kvern, Dr Kathrine Lawrence, Dr Cheri Bethune, Dr Keith Wilson, Dr Alison Baker, Dr Erich Hanel, Dr Annelise Miller, Dr Theresa van der Goes and Dr Karen Schultz
A crucial component of assessment in health professions education is making summative (high-stakes) decisions about how well a learner is progressing within their training program, and/or the learner’s level of competence. Much work has been accomplished across the health professions in defining the competencies that should be assessed during training in a variety of health professions education programs. However, there is still work to be done in two crucial areas: first, determining what kinds of assessment information need to be collected about a learner’s progression towards competence; and second, establishing effective ways for training programs to make sense of the assessment information collected. For many programs, the second area is of particular concern, as they struggle to determine appropriate processes for competence committees to combine various pieces of assessment data in order to arrive at defensible and accountable summative decisions. The workshop will discuss key concepts of defensible summative decision making, framed in the context of published evidence, theory, and best practices. These include: programmatic assessment, matching tools to purpose, rater cognition, and sensibly combining a variety of assessment tools to come to a progress decision about a learner.