Examinations
We develop examinations for people wanting to become a fully registered pharmacist in Australia.
This year we have seen great improvement in our exam development methodology. This ensures defensible and reliable exams and results in fairness and clear identification of competent candidates.
Types of exams we develop and deliver:
Intern Written Exam
This exam tests the competency of pharmacy interns in Australia. Candidates sitting the exam must have completed at least 75% of the required supervised practice hours in Australia.
CAOP (Competency Assessment of Overseas Pharmacists) exam
This exam tests the competency of pharmacists to practise in an Australian setting. Candidates sitting the exam are pharmacists trained and registered in:
- Canada
- Ireland
- United Kingdom (UK), OR
- United States of America (USA)
KAPS (Knowledge Assessment of Pharmaceutical Sciences) exam
This exam tests the knowledge of current pharmaceutical sciences in an Australian setting. Candidates sitting the exam are from countries other than those listed above.
Number of exam attempts:
Total number of candidate attempts was 2188
We saw the number of exam attempts return to typical numbers this year despite the interruptions of the pandemic. The introduction of online proctored exams and Rasch modelling methodology contributes to this.
Number of overseas trained pharmacists attempts at KAPS
Number of overseas trained pharmacists attempts at CAOP
Number of Australian Intern Written Exam candidate attempts
Number of OnVUE online proctored exams
Of the 1580 Intern Written Exam attempts, 34.1% were supervised remotely via OnVUE.
Exam writing workshops
We had 4 exam writing workshops between July 2020 and June 2021:
Intern Written Exam Bookmarking workshop
We held a bookmarking workshop to determine the cut score for the Intern Written Exam. In September 2020, we were fortunate to hold a face to face workshops with Dr Curtis Lee in Adelaide.
Exam writing workshops
We use exam writing workshops to train Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) in how to best develop questions for our exams.
- Between March and May 2021, we held 2 Intern Written Exam item writing and reviewing workshops, producing 153 new questions.
- In June 2021, we held 1 KAPS item writing and reviewing workshop via Zoom, producing 119 new questions.
- Our SMEs joined via Zoom from across 6 states or territories within Australia.