School Finds It’s Not Lonely at the Top

The publicists at Palomar Community College have learned some of the perils of self-promotion.

Based on what they thought were glowing results of a national licensing examination of would-be registered nurses, the San Marcos college issued a press release headlined, “Palomar College Nurses Ranked 1 in State, Nation.”

The press release read:

“Not all national intercollegiate championships are won on athletic fields. Sometimes they can be won in an examination room.

‘Highest in the Nation’

“This point has just been proven by a team of 30 proud graduates of Palomar College’s registered nursing program who achieved the highest ranking in the nation on the July 1988 National Council Licensure Examination for Registered Nurses.

“A total of 52,284 students from 1,418 nursing education programs took the July examination, including students from four-year institutions. The 30 students from Palomar, a two-year community college, outranked them all.”

Well, not quite.

Palomar officials based their glowing report on a summary provided by CTB/McGraw-Hill, which compiles the test results on behalf of the National Council of State Boards of Nursing and distributes them to colleges who pay $300 for the analysis.

Indeed, Palomar’s summary profile showed that the college ranked “1st of 93” among nursing programs in California, and “1st of 1,418” among all nursing programs in the United States, Guam, American Samoa, the Virgin Islands and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariani Islands.

Wow, Palomar thought. This is tremendous; we’re the best in the country.

But the fine print on the summary page noted: “The rankings were based on the percentage of your graduates passing the exam.”

In other words, Palomar was not the only college in the nation to be ranked “1st.” Indeed, 115 nursing programs around the nation also were ranked at the top because they, too, had 100% pass rates on the July test; in California, five nursing programs had 100% pass rates. Palomar was among them.

Nancy Miller, assistant director of testing services for the National Council of State Boards of Nursing, said there is no attempt to rank colleges in the nation for the success of their nursing programs based on test results. In fact, she said, the July test was scored solely on a pass/no-pass basis, as opposed to the basis of actual test scores, and so the only ranking done by CTB/McGraw-Hill was on the basis of the number of students who simply passed the test.

Numerical test scores are no longer used, she said, because students and colleges tried to manipulate those figures for their own individual, or collegiate, promotion. “That was a misuse of the test scores,” she said.

Goal of Nursing Test

“The only thing the test measures is minimal competence to practice nursing,” Miller said. “It is not an achievement test. It’s not designed to determine who is better than others, but simply who is competent (for nursing) and who is not.”

But confusing the issue was the fact that CTB/McGraw-Hill had not totally reprogrammed its computers to reflect the new philosophy. While the rankings were made on the basis of what percentage of students passed the test, colleges were nonetheless still given individual student scores and a mean average of their students’ scores. Palomar believed its ranking meant its students’ mean score was the highest in the nation, and sent out the proud press release.

And a handful of other colleges around the country did the same, because they too had 100% pass rates and found themselves ranked No. 1.

A CTB/McGraw-Hill official acknowledged the confusion, and said that when the analysis of the next test is distributed, it will more clearly define what exactly is meant by a No. 1 ranking.