Ground rules for boards

[deleted314957]

It is possible I have laboring under a misperception.

Is there a passing “score” for passing these? And, by score, for example, I mean a score or 70%=70 correct of 100 total. No weighting, etc. IF there is a score and no one makes it would they flunk EVERYONE?

NO


OR, will they always pass a certain percentage REGARDLESS of the raw score? Will they always allow 85 % to pass(and no more), 75%, 50%, 15%. Would they flunk EVERYONE?

NO

Therefore, unless you have ever performed academically in the bottom 15% of a cohort you will not fail your boards.

In my experience, those who pass soaked up the essentials over 4 years and those who do not pass did not. I really think studying takes away from productive work for several months and causes undue stress. Those who did not figure it out in four years can study, usually to no avail.

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[tiredguy]

I have heard - which may not be true and may not apply to the the new remote version of the boards - that every few years performance of questions were analyzed and this would indeed be used to set a "passing score" or "passing performance" for subsequent years. So, if true, that would theoretically mean more people could fail in a given year, assuming a particular year severely underperforms previous years. But, this is unlikely to happen since there is unlikely much variation from year to year. I do not know if this was ever true or still applies, only the ABP really knows for sure.

But I would tend to agree that average to above average performers should not worry about failing the boards and that, especially with AP, learning over 4 years is significantly more valuable than trying to cram AP in a short period of time. However, some people can succumb to paralyzing stress given the stakes of a single exam and this in itself could lead to a poor performance and failure. Providing additional time to study may help relieve stress by allowing them to build confidence by studying. Or it could lead to more stress by giving them more time to stress out about it, realizing that there is no possible way to study/know everything.