A Process and Rubric for a Group to Review the Quality of a Medical Education Course/Clerkship

INTRODUCTION: Reviewing elements of a curriculum, such as courses and clerkships in medical school, is an essential part of the quality improvement process. Yet there is a gap in the literature in terms of actual rubrics for evaluating course quality in medical schools. METHODS: This resource describes a course review process and rubric to evaluate course quality: A subcommittee of faculty members and students evaluates goals, content and delivery, assessment, feedback to students, grading, and student feedback for each course with the rubric. Course directors, Curriculum Committee members, and Curriculum Evaluation Subcommittee members were surveyed on their perception of the process. RESULTS: A large majority of Curriculum Committee and Curriculum Evaluation Subcommittee members agreed that the review process was objective (100%), provided an evaluation of course quality (>95%), helped identify areas of improvement/strengths (>91%) and issues/concerns in the curriculum (>95%), helped them become more familiar with the curriculum (>90%), and was a catalyst for changes in a course (>77%). Course/clerkship directors had less agreement that the course review process was a catalyst for curriculum changes (46%) and that the process helped identify areas of improvement for a course (62%). DISCUSSION: This curriculum evaluation process provides a resource for other institutions to use and/or modify for their own course evaluation process. All stakeholders in the review process agreed that the evaluation process was successful in identifying areas that worked and did not work in courses.