Faculty development programs improve the quality of Multiple Choice Questions items' writing

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Assessment and Evaluation

Background:

• High-quality assessment tools are crucial for medical education.
• Faculty development programs (FDPs) are essential for enhancing teaching and assessment skills.
• The quality of multiple choice questions (MCQs) written by faculty can be variable.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of long term faculty development programs (FDPs) in improving the quality of MCQ item writing.
• To assess changes in MCQ item characteristics after faculty participation in FDPs.

Main Methods:

• A quasi-experimental study involving newly joined faculty members.
• Analysis of MCQs for difficulty index, discriminating index, reliability, Bloom's cognitive levels, item writing flaws (IWFs), and non-functioning distractors (NFDs).
• Pre- and post-training comparisons of MCQ item quality across respiratory, cardiovascular, and renal block courses.

Main Results:

• Significant improvement in MCQ difficulty index (p = 0.003) and discriminating index (p = 0.132) post-FDP.
• Increase in MCQs targeting higher cognitive levels of Bloom's taxonomy (p<0.0001).
• Reduction in item writing flaws (IWFs) and non-functioning distractors (NFDs) (p<0.02).

Conclusions:

• Long term FDPs are effective in improving the quality of MCQ item writing.
• Newly joined faculty benefit significantly from active participation in FDPs for assessment development.
• FDPs contribute to creating more valid and reliable assessment tools in medical education.