[IPAC-List] promotional exam strategy

[Jim Kuthy]

With this approach you potentially limit what is to be learned. For example, if a particular policy and procedure contains five different elements, but you only have one question about that P&P in your study guide, then the remaining four elements will likely never be studied by candidates. 

With that in mind, this approach would appear to be a good practice when all of the possible elements that candidates would need to know are contained in the study guide. However, that means you would essentially have to re-write all of the important parts of the P&Ps into test questions. Instead, it would appear to be easier (as well as possibly more job related) to have candidates study the actual P&Ps, especially since on the job they likely need to be able to read and interpret the P&Ps, instead of some "cheat sheet." 

Jim Kuthy, Ph.D.
Biddle Consulting Group, Inc.
Folsom, CA 

-----Original Message-----
From: Morris, Ramona (JUS) [mailto:Ramona.Morris at ontario.ca] 
Sent: Tuesday, June 28, 2011 11:32 AM
To: ipac-list at ipacweb.org
Subject: [IPAC-List] promotional exam strategy

Situation: 

A police service is using a test on their local policy and procedures as
part of the promotional process.  Candidates are provided with the pool
of items (say 500)...just the stems without the distractors. The test
consists of a subset of multiple choice items(say 100). 

The argument is that they want candidates to know all of the p and p,
and it is up to the candidate to prepare themselves. And, exam security
becomes less of a headache.

Questions: 

1.    What is this strategy called?

2.    Do you have any advice about its use?

3.    What do we know about the strategy (e.g. validity, reliability
efficiency etc.)

 

Ramona Morris

Ontario Police College

Aylmer, Ontario