How come grading scales for passing classes in NS are so much higher in the USA?

Published

My NS in Canada only requires that you have a 63% to pass a nursing class and a 50% for an elective - BSCN degree. How come the passing grades for nursing school are usually like a 75 - 80% in the States? I would seriously fail if I had to have an 80% to pass every nursing class!

How are the grading scales for other people in Canada who are going to nursing school? Is my school the exception or something? My friend's nursing school only requires you to have a 60% to pass nursing classes in her BSCN degree.

Hmmm, maybe its a provincial thing or something

Up Vote Up Vote ×

More like an indiviidual school thing. My PN courses required between 70 and 80's to pass.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Med-surg.

Hey!

I'm in Ontario and my school is the same 63% to pass all nursing courses.. I was also reading about the grading scales in the US:stone and saw the failing mark was below 76 or something!.. not sure how that works but nonetheless I'm pretty sure our schools are up to par and far from being "easy" at least from my own experience..

Up Vote Up Vote ×

My guess would be is that your 63% would be equal to the US 76% there has been grade inflation that could the reason.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
My guess would be is that your 63% would be equal to the US 76% there has been grade inflation that could the reason.

I doubt 63% equals to 75%. 63% in Canada, is 63% in USA. I guess USA has higher standards. I am really surprise to see that they let nurses progress with only knowing 63% of the information given to them.

Heck, at the school I attended the Medication Calculation class passing grade have to be 90% an A. Yes, you have to average 90% at the end of the semester to move one and this class is given as one of first class you take in nursing program, along with Nursing Fundamentals (75%) pass grade , and you have to pass both to move on or else you fail out of the program. Also, before the start of the following semester you have to take the dosage exam again and pass with 90%, this goes on until you graduated. Very demanding, but at the end of it all, they are making sure they give you the tools to practice safely as a nurse. The rest of the classes required a 75% average ©. Even if you get 74% you still fail.

Then again, as you say, maybe that 63% is not really below average overthere, but view as a © average. But anyway I look at it, 63% is much easier to get than 75%.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
I doubt 63% equals to 75%. 63% in Canada, is 63% in USA. I guess USA has higher standards. I am really surprise to see that they let nurses progress with only knowing 63% of the information given to them.

Heck, at the school I attended the Medication Calculation class passing grade have to be 90% an A. Yes, you have to average 90% at the end of the semester to move one and this class is given as one of first class you take in nursing program, along with Nursing Fundamentals (75%) pass grade , and you have to pass both to move on or else you fail out of the program. Also, before the start of the following semester you have to take the dosage exam again and pass with 90%, this goes on until you graduated. Very demanding, but at the end of it all, they are making sure they give you the tools to practice safely as a nurse. The rest of the classes required a 75% average ©. Even if you get 74% you still fail.

Then again, as you say, maybe that 63% is not really below average overthere, but view as a © average. But anyway I look at it, 63% is much easier to get than 75%.

I stand corrected, 90% is just consider the passing grade ©. 92-95% would be B and 96-100% would be A.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.
Heck, at the school I attended the Medication Calculation class passing grade have to be 90%

Hmm, at my Canadian nursing school our medication calculations class had a passing score of 100%. Everyone had to score 100%, no exceptions. No 100%, no pass. And if you failed it three times you were out. Period.

Our grades were a combination of multiple choice exams, papers, care plans and oral presentations. Grading all but the multiple choice exams is a subjective process and takes into consideration so much more than what you know. For example, if we didn't use perfect APA format on our papers we lost marks. If we didn't use the exact wording our instructor would have used on our care plans, we lost marks. If we chose a nursing diagnosis that would have been a priority for ourselves as patients, but it wasn't one of the ones on the instructor's list, no matter how perfectly it was expanded on the care plan, we lost marks. AND... we had some instructors who used the exact NANDA template and others who liked a more free-form model. If we fidgeted in front of the rest of the class and said "umm" too many times in our oral presentations, we lost marks. So it is possible that my 63% might equate to your 75% in terms of what I actually know.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Hmm, at my Canadian nursing school our medication calculations class had a passing score of 100%. Everyone had to score 100%, no exceptions. No 100%, no pass. And if you failed it three times you were out. Period.

Our grades were a combination of multiple choice exams, papers, care plans and oral presentations. Grading all but the multiple choice exams is a subjective process and takes into consideration so much more than what you know. For example, if we didn't use perfect APA format on our papers we lost marks. If we didn't use the exact wording our instructor would have used on our care plans, we lost marks. If we chose a nursing diagnosis that would have been a priority for ourselves as patients, but it wasn't one of the ones on the instructor's list, no matter how perfectly it was expanded on the care plan, we lost marks. AND... we had some instructors who used the exact NANDA template and others who liked a more free-form model. If we fidgeted in front of the rest of the class and said "umm" too many times in our oral presentations, we lost marks. So it is possible that my 63% might equate to your 75% in terms of what I actually know.

Everything that you describe I experienced in the US system also. I don't think the focus should be in the numbers. However, when you only have 3 exams a quarter (we had quarter instead of a semester system) and there are only 50 questions on a test and you have to get 78% to pass you really can't get many wrong to fail out of nursing school. I wish we could have received marks for something besides the subjective multiple choice exams. You could do amazingly well in clinical and still fail out due to those 3 little itty bitty exams per quarter. But at the same time if you fail clinical you fail anyway as it should be. It really does vary school to school though, what the standards are. And even though it was a horrible experience being a nursing student I am glad now that our instructors were tough because it does pay off in the end. Here in Arizona I have to think that this is not the case since many of the new nurses coming out of school seem to really be lacking the ability to think. It is shocking really. And yes...in our school we also had to have 100% on all of of our math tests (dosage calculations). APA in my experience is really only a factor in a BSN program and believe me I get it. I am in a RN to BSN program right now and I have yet to find an instructor who completely follows the same APA. Each class I have taken I have seen a different version of APA and just have learned to adapt to the instructors preference...LOL.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.
APA in my experience is really only a factor in a BSN program and believe me I get it. I am in a RN to BSN program right now and I have yet to find an instructor who completely follows the same APA. Each class I have taken I have seen a different version of APA and just have learned to adapt to the instructors preference...LOL.

I was in a diploma program; we had three university courses we had to complete. I had never seen APA before and had no clue. I took Intro to Psych and Intro to Soc by correspondence and had many points taken off my first couple of papers until I got the hang of it. Your instructor variability was like my obstetrics rotation with nursing care plans. We had two clinical instructors, one for L&D and one for ante- and post-partum. They had very different formats and expectations and one of them failed just about everybody on their NCPs. We all called her the Little Troll. (One of my classmates thought she was the cleaning lady!)

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in OB, HH, ADMIN, IC, ED, QI.
Hey!

I'm in Ontario and my school is the same 63% to pass all nursing courses.. I was also reading about the grading scales in the US:stone and saw the failing mark was below 76 or something!.. not sure how that works but nonetheless I'm pretty sure our schools are up to par and far from being "easy" at least from my own experience..

I graduated from a 3 year hospital program in Montreal, which required higher grades to pass, than Ontario. However, experience has taught me, that nursing schools at universities in the USA have the same protocols as high school there......... exams and tests are only about the content in one semester/quarter's course. In Canada, the entire school year's material is on the exams, hence the allowance for lower scores.

When I took the American origin licensing exam in Montreal (which "didn't hold water" in Ontario), I couldn't believe how easy I found the "objective" questions. Applying logic was the main skill I needed, with the knowledge I'd attained; and I achieved the highest grade in Canada and the USA, that year, 1960. Yes, I'm a dinosaur, but I continued my education, got my degree and qualified for better jobs in the USA. Now I wish I could have gone back (for their health care program, which is great!), but I married an American, and my grown children are here.

Administrative nurses at hospitals in the USA told me that Canadian nurses are more prepared and skilled, than American ones, and they loved getting Canadian nurses. So I pretty much got any job I wanted back then. Believe me, it isn't that Canadian nurses are dumber, that causes the grading system to look easy. It's not. When we were pitted against American nurses, taking the same exams they did, we excelled.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I wouldn't automatically assume that standards are higher in the US. It could well be that a 63% in Canadian schools represents the same level of accomplishment and mastery of content as an 80% in a US school. It would be hard to make a determination about that without examing both programs in detail.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Nursing Professional Development.
I wouldn't automatically assume that standards are higher in the US. It could well be that a 63% in Canadian schools represents the same level of accomplishment and mastery of content as an 80% in a US school. It would be hard to make a determination about that without examing both programs in detail.

elkpark is right (no surprise there). You can tell NOTHING from the required scores alone. They tell you nothing about the level of difficulty of the tests. Someone who gets 100% on a test may know a whole let less than someone who gets a 70% on a much more difficult test, etc. That should be obvious to anyone who pauses to think about it for a minute.

My experience is that Canadian nurses are equally as well educated as US nurses. There are great schools and not-so-great schools on both sides of the border.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Join the Discussion