Pharmaceutical Weekly Assessed Tutorial Sheets (PWATS)
Tracy Garnier1, Mark Russell2
1 School of Pharmacy, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, Herts, AL10 9AB, UK.
2 Aerospace, Automotive and Design Engineering, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, Herts, AL10 9AB, UK.
80
Introduction
Performing accurate pharmaceutical calculations is a critical element
in the provision of optimal patient care. Numeracy, therefore, is a
core requirement within the MPharm programme (Dewdney, 2002).
This study investigated the impact of Pharmaceutical Weekly
Assessed Tutorial Sheets (PWATS) on level 1 and 2 MPharm
student learning behaviours and evaluated this assessment method.
60
Number of submission
41.8% of
submissions were
made outside of
typical office
hours (09:00 –
17:00).
13.2% of submissions
made just 2 hr prior
deadline.
70
50
40
Level 1 (2006-07); n = 811
Level 1 (2005-06); n = 426
30
Level 2 (2006-07); n = 307
20
Methods
Student unique PWATS were issued to level 1 and level 2 MPharm
students over 6-8 weeks. Student answers were collected using the
WATS data gatherer at the Learning Resources Centres. Computer
assisted marking and feedback used AutoMarkWizard. In addition to
student performance, a total of 1544 submission times were
analysed from 2005 to 2007. Student feedback from PWATSspecific questionnaires using a 5-point attitudinal scale* (see
handout) was obtained for level 1 and 2 students in 2006/07.
Results & Discussion
Student performance for level 1 students (Figure 1) indicated similar
scores over two years. Approximately 17% of submissions were
below the pass rate of 70% (set to reflect the pharmacy preregistration exam pass rate).
10
0
0
25
50
75
100
125
150
175
Submission timings (hours prior to deadline)
Figure 3: Summary of PWATS submission times for level 1
and level 2 students
Questionnaire response rates for the level 1 and level 2 students
were 58.4% and 82.4% respectively. In both years (Figure 4)
students agreed PWATS helped them ‘realize the importance of
numeracy in pharmacy’ (Q.14) and believed PWATS would help
them in their examinations (Q.2). However the responses showed
how both years disliked completing the worksheets every week
(Q.13) and they did not trust the automated data
collection/marking (Q.10).
5
120
Test mean
71.8% (2006)
69.7% (2007)
2006-07
100
Class mean %
(+/- std dev)
80
60
PWATS mean
81.3% (2006)
84.7% (2007)
40
20
Level 2
3
2
1
0
0
PWATS 1
PWATS 2
PWATS 3
PWATS 4
PWATS 5
PWATS 6
PWATS 7
PWATS 8
PWATS
mean
Class test
mean
Figure 1: Level 1 PWATS scores (SD)
Level 2 scores (Figure 2) indicated lower scores than in level 1 and
approximately 36% of submissions were below the 70% pass rate.
120
100
80
Class mean %
(+/- std dev)
Level 1
4
Mean score on 5-point attitudinal scale
(1 = strongly agree; 5 = strongly disagree)
2005-06
60
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
PWATS feedback questions (please see handout)
Figure 4: Summary of student comments to PWATS
questionnaire (details shown in handout)*
Specific student comments included:
"PWATS is one of the best aspects of the pharmacy degree. I
was worried that my numeracy was not good enough, but am now
confident that it is in fact better than that of most of the other
students. Entering answers online is much less hassle than
handing things in at the office. Can we do more assessments like
this please?"
40
PWATS mean
69.7% (2007)
20
0
PWATS 1
PWATS 2
PWATS 3
PWATS 4
PWATS 5
PWATS 6
PWATS mean
Figure 2: Level 2 PWATS scores (SD)
PWATS submission times (Figure 3) show the study patterns of
students and reflects the flexibility of e-learning.
“I think the assessment is a good idea because it gives us a
chance to practise the calculations and see how much we know. I
also quite like the handing in method, because you can submit the
work at any time and don’t need to wait for office hours”
Discussion & Future Work
In general the feedback from students has been very positive. In
particular, they welcomed the marks and personalized feedback
obtained following each submission. Future work will look at
mapping numeracy throughout the MPharm programme and
reinforcing links between modules and PWATS worksheets. Other
developments might include confidence levels for student
answers.
References: Dewdney, R. (2002) Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain;
Russell, M. (2005) J Enhancement Learn Teach, 2:26 – 35.