excelsior college--minimum grade for exams?

PiedPiperRN · May 19, 2010

The exams totally baffled me. When you get the results you get a letter grade and a percentage of what questions you got right. (ie, 73% on Oxygenation and 83% on cardiac, or whatever is on the exam...)

When I took my first exam, they handed me the breakdown sheet and my heart sank because a quick glance showed me that I didn't get higher then 80% in anything, and the average seemed to hover around the low 70%'s. But when I looked to see if I had gotten a C, I was shocked (and happy) to see that I was awarded an 'A'!

(I actually hid the breakdown sheet from everyone and was terrified for about a week that I would get a call from EC saying that they had made a mistake and were taking back my grade.)

Another test I scored in the high 80%'s, but was given a 'B'. Go figure. Even factoring experimental questions doesn't explain the disrepency.

TashaLPN2006RN2012, ASN, RN · May 19, 2010

i thought it was based on the percent of each section...like if there are 5 sections on a test and each are weighed differently and the first section is worth 10% well if you got all of those right but the next four sections are worth 80% of your total score and you didnt do too well on those then you could potentially fail it right???

PiedPiperRN · May 19, 2010

Nope. Applying the percentage to the weight of each section does not give you a grade. For me, I got an 'A' in one exam that I got about 79% and a 'B' in an exam that I got 82% in. Go figure.

I think that it has to do with a mixture of how hard the questions are, experimental questions, and other factors.

The short answer is that it is really not possible to say what grade is a passing grade. Someone else might be able to shine some light on this... Sorry!

Editorial Team / Moderator · May 20, 2010

As long as your overall grade is a C or better, you pass. That's about as much as any EC student or grad can tell you! The rest is as vegastar says -- the questions are weighted, some don't count, and it's nearly impossible to make sense of the breakdown page.

Conqueror+, BSN, RN · May 21, 2010

A C is passing but I STRONGLY suggest that you prepare and do your best on every exam. The bare minimum will come back to bite you when its time for the CPNE and NCLEX

SweettartRN · May 23, 2010

I'm glad someone brought this up.

I too, have found it to be extremely confusing, and more than a little terrifying that they don't tell you how you got to the grade that you do.

Normally it's a straightforward, you got 23 our of 200 questions wrong, and your grade is this.

With Excelsior, it's not like that at all, which I find to be a bit hard to swallow at times.

A percentage of where you went wrong, is hardly help to determine where you need to study.

I would really like for them to release the formula that they use to determine grades. It would help a lot.

Editorial Team / Moderator · May 23, 2010

There is a Technical Handbook that explains the grading methodology:

https://www.excelsior.edu/Excelsior_College/My_Excelsior_College/Publications/Excelsior_College_Exams_Technical_Handbook_2008.pdf

I think you have to be signed in to view it, but it does explain the grading methodology. The EC exams aren't that different from the NCLEX -- I have to say that the NCLEX felt like another EC exam, but without being able to know my grade for a couple of days! :)

acelawler · May 28, 2010

The results are "curved" according to what students at incampus colleges scored. I too was baffled by my test grades, sometimes a 86 was an A, sometimes a B.