Do students from public schools fare better in medical school than their colleagues from private schools? If so, what can we learn from this?

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2018

Authors

Cristina Costa Santos (Author) FMUP; Vieira Marques, P (Author) FMUP; Costa-Pereira A (Author) FMUP; Ferreira MA (Author) FMUP; Freitas A (Author) FMUP

Journal

Title: BMC Medical Education

Vol. 18

ISSN: 1472-6920

Publisher: Springer Nature

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 2 Citations

Scopus - 3 Citations

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-00N-SVB

DOI: 10.1186/s12909-018-1162-x

Abstract (EN): Background: Internal grade inflation is a documented practice in secondary schools (mostly in private schools) that jeopardises fairness with regard to access to medical school. However, it is frequently assumed that the higher internal grades are in fact justifiable, as they correspond to better preparation of students in private schools in areas that national exams do not cover but nevertheless are important. Consequently, it is expected that students from private schools will succeed better in medical school than their colleagues, or at least not perform worse. We aimed to study whether students from private schools do fare better in medical school than their colleagues from public schools, even after adjusting for internal grade inflation. Methods: We analysed all students that entered into a medical course from 2007 to 2014. A linear regression was performed using mean grades for the 1st-year curse units (CU) of the medical school curriculum as a dependent variable and student gender, the nature of students' secondary school (public/private), and whether their secondary school highly inflated grades as independent variables. A logistic regression was also performed, modelling whether or not students failed at least one CU exam during the 1st year of medical school as a function of the aforementioned independent variables. Results: Of the 1709 students analysed, 55% came from public secondary schools. Private (vs. public) secondary school (beta = -0.459, p < 0.001) and whether secondary schools highly inflated grades (beta = -0.246, p = 0.003) were independent factors that significantly influenced grades during the first year of medical school. Having attended a private secondary school also significantly increased the odds of a student having failed at least one CU exam during the 1st year of medical school (OR = 1.33), even after adjusting for whether or not the secondary school used highly inflated grades. Conclusions: It is important to further discuss what we can learn from the fact that students from public secondary schools seem to be better prepared for medical school teaching methodologies than their colleagues from private ones and the implications for the selection process.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 7