COM – Formative and Mid-course Feedback

Policy Number: 3349-AC-407
Effective Date: 07/01/2018
Updated: 02/22/2022
Reviewed: —
Responsible Department: Medical Education, College of Medicine
Applies To: College of Medicine
Approval Authority: Dean, College of Medicine

A. Purpose

To ensure that medical students are provided with feedback sufficiently early in each applicable course to allow sufficient time to improve identified knowledge and skills deficits in accordance with the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME Functions and Structure of a Medical School, effective July 1, 2021).  The relevant element is as follows:  Element 9.7 Formative Assessment and Feedback.

B. Scope

This Policy applies to all required credit-bearing courses in the College of Medicine in which a grade is assigned to the student and appears on the student’s official transcript. The course must be of sufficient length to allow the opportunity for formative and/or mid-course feedback and corrective action for deficits to occur in order for this Policy to apply.

C. Definitions

1. Credit-bearing Course: A course offered by the College of Medicine in which a student is enrolled, the course appears on the student’s official transcript with either contact hours or credit-bearing acknowledgment, and a grade is assigned.

D. Policy Statement

1. The Curriculum Committee (CC) is responsible for ensuring that all courses provide formative feedback sufficiently early in the course to allow time for student remediation, and that those courses that are of sufficient length to provide formal mid-course formative performance feedback to individual students include intentional plans for doing so as part of the course student assessment strategies. This formative feedback and formal mid-course formative feedback are intended to be for student learning, and thus, should contribute less than 25% to the student’s final grade in the course.
   1. Formative and formal mid-course formative feedback may take the form of verbal or written performance feedback based on observation and/or assessments such as quizzes, practice tests, study questions, examination reviews, and/or formative clinical skills assessment.
   2. It is assumed that all applicable courses will provide formative feedback to students early enough in the course, and no later than mid-point, to allow sufficient time for remediation. If the course is unable to do so, it will be indicated in the course syllabus.
   3. Course directors will report about the type of formative and/or formal mid-course formative feedback provided as part of the course review process. If the course does not provide the opportunity for formative and/or formal mid-course formative feedback, as applicable, the reason(s) for the inability to do so will be indicated.
2. The internal course and clerkship evaluations will include questions asking about student satisfaction with formative feedback in the first/second years and formal mid-course feedback in the third/fourth years.
3. The course director is responsible for on-going monitoring of the provision of formative and/or formal mid-course formative feedback for applicable courses with oversight by the appropriate CC sub-committee and the associate dean for medical education.
   1. Results from internal course evaluations and the annual Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) Graduation Questionnaire (GQ) will be provided to course directors and committees.

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