An adaptive private pilot certification exam

Adapting aviation certification exams to each examinee's ability may reduce administration costs and increase the accuracy of certification decisions. Several means of adapting exams are based upon item response theory. Item response theory allows one to empirically describe a test item very precisely before it is administered. Use of each item's description and an examinee's response enables one to estimate the examinee's ability and select the next item to best refine this estimate. An exploratory application of this technique to one step of the certification of private pilots has raised several important questions.