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Office of Operational Services, Assessment, CQI & Accreditation
Center for Translational Medicine
Office of Operational Services, Assessment, CQI & Accreditation
Islam Mohamed, B. Pharm, MS, PhD [BIO]
Assistant Dean, Assistant Professor of Pharmacology
Adjunct Assistant Professor, California Northstate University College of Pharmacy
Assessment is a major component of any educational program and it is an integral part of the learning process that measures, quantifies, and describes students’ performance. It is the testing component of a curriculum through which both faculty and learners are informed about teaching/learning effectiveness. Without assessment, determining students’ acquisition of the required knowledge, skills, and attitudes becomes almost impossible.
On the other hand, the process of evaluation involves monitoring, comparing and judging the quality of academic performance at all levels. It determines whether attending a course/program has really enhanced meeting the learning expectations and how well. There are many parameters affecting students’ performance that need to be considered to judge the quality of an educational program. Curriculum courses/clerkships, faculty, learning environment, teaching pedagogies and assessment methods are all among many other factors that need to be included in the overall program evaluation.
Together with assessment, evaluation helps to benchmark students’ performance to verify that the students are on the path toward achieving the program learning outcomes.
The overarching goal of CNUCOM Assessment and Evaluation process is to achieve the standards of excellence in medical education and maintain its program compliance with the requirements of the accreditation bodies including California Bureau for Private Postsecondary (BPPE), the WASC Senior College and University Commission (WSCUC), and the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME). The standards and regulations of BPPE, WSCUC, and LCME are used by CNUCOM as guiding tools for improvement at both educational and administrative levels.