The Red and Black

Originally posted by

Winfield J. Abbe

All this shows what a joke these pharmacy board tests are in the first place. Obviously, like many university professors, they are too lazy to make up a new examination each time. Why don't they sue every student who divulged the test questions to the pharmacy professor? This is ridiculous. Years ago a parent came to me from another state complaining that I gave her daughter, who missed the final examination, a different test than the others took at the regular time. This is exactly why I did this, because her daughter could have obtained the questions from those who did take the test at the time, as I explained to the parent. When I was a student at UC Berkeley, if you missed a final examination you either received an F or possibly an incomplete in the course and were usually told to take the final examination of the next section the next time it was offered. Professors there did not waste valuable time giving make up examinations. Since no professor there ever gave the same examination twice, there was no chance of having the same questions. In fact the library had copies of old tests of professors available for study by students and all students were encouraged to study and learn from them. The lazy Pharmacy Boards have no right to charge students for taking a test which never changes. This is fraud. They should be the ones in court, not this good professor. There are certain things that cannot be patented anyway. You can't patent Newton's laws and questions may be asked in a myriad of ways.

Originally posted by

Alex Ward

I am a 3rd year pharmacy student and I've already had some people on campus asking me about the integrity of the pharmacist education due to the quagmire involving professor Warren. My response is that the data has been misconstrued. Before you start making conclusions on what has taken place, you may want to do your homework. I've spoken with several recent PharmD graduates who took the course, and they agree that these accusations are not accurate. They said the course was comparable to a KAPLAN course for the MCAT or PCAT (simply being preparatory).

I am exorbitantly appalled that the Red and Black would include in this article an online poll asking if one would trust a pharmacist educated at UGA. It should be noted that UGA pharmacy graduates are NOT the only people that have benefited from this review course. Many other schools in the nation have had students take this course prior to state/national board examination.

The average GPA of the entering PharmD class here at UGA was 3.7, with an average PCAT score of 92.5 (based on a 99 percentile rank score). The University Of Mississippi School Of Pharmacy (noted second on the Red and Black's skewed bar graph of NAPLEX passing rates) had an incoming PharmD class with an average GPA of 3.29 and an average PCAT score of only 61. Mercer University School of Pharmacy graduates usually comprise a generous proportion of the body of students taking the review course at the UGA site. Mercer's entering PharmD class had an average GPA of 3.5 and an average PCAT score of 86. However, the bar graph in the article above indicates that Mercer holds the lowest position in passing rates among the listed schools (by a whopping 6.5%) below UGA. Additionally, some South University School of Pharmacy (Savannah, GA) students took the review course, and it's evident that they do not show up in the data comparisons listed in this article. According to an interview I just had with an admissions counselor at the South University School of Pharmacy, their recently-admitted PharmD class had an average GPA of 3.3 and an average PCAT score of 71. However, their NAPLEX pass rate is 96% (not included in bar graph).

So if you're going to have a poll that asks if one would trust UGA pharmacy graduates, perhaps you should include the same poll for each pharmacy school that has had students use this board review course. Then you could do side-by-side comparisons.

According to the NABP website, only 15 of 91 schools of pharmacy (2002-2006) had less than a 90% pass rate on the NAPLEX. I think that the statistics used by the author of this Red and Black article are incongruous. Did the authors consider confounding covariates in their analysis? For example, I have a friend who attended the University Of Washington College Of Pharmacy in Seattle. She, along with several of her classmates, didn't attend the review course offered by Professor Warren, but were able to locate the course packet for personal review. This should be considered a possible source of variance in the analysis, as to not just exclusively point fingers at UGA pharmacy graduates.

It should be noted that KAPLAN, ASHP and various pharmacy schools offer very similar (if not identical) review courses for PharmD graduates. Why is it that Professor Warren is being treated this way? Is it because he is an individual offering this course service, and not an organization such as KAPLAN or ASHP?

Once again, data is easily skewed and misrepresentative of what is true. I would personally like to know where Kristen Coulter, Alexis Garrobo, Juanita Cousins and Brian Hughes got all their information. It seems to me that the entire situation has been blown completely out of proportion.

Alex H. Ward
Doctor of Pharmacy Candidate
Class of 2009
University of Georgia
College of Pharmacy

Originally posted by

Rick

I have read all of the court documents and its obvious that this professor was stealing the questions and then charging other schools thousands of dollars for him to come "teach" at seminars and charging students hundreds for "his" review materials. What a scum bag.

Originally posted by

ryan

Shame on you R&B.

First off, this entire case will probably be thrown out because of the malfeasance of the NABP in regards to the gag order imposed by the courts, which is why the University did not notify anyone.

So if you're shaking your heads, perhaps you should touch up on the court papers that are posted on your own web site.

Secondly, if you believe Dr. Warren was wreaking havoc on anything or anybody, perhaps you will consider the affects of the R&B's story on the University, and rethink the meaning of havoc wreaking.

In some twisted way you may feel like you're doing a favor to UGA and perhaps your own journalism careers, but the gag order imposed by the court restricts your reporters from accessing any and all of the main players in the story, and the result is nothing more than smear and spin.

Thirdly, perhaps if you had been in the courtroom, you would have seen and heard the actual nature of this case, and would realize how false your story is, but your reporters were not on the ball, not in the courtroom, and were resigned to contact alumni and then spin their comments to create controversy.

Perhaps if you had obtained a packet of Dr. Warren's notes (which are probably still available if you dig) you would be able to see the slippery slope of the NABP's allegations, but I guess digging is not really what R&B reporters are used to.

The R&B is a paper that excels at producing soft news. News about the most recent Nuci's space benefit, and news about the speculative nature of a Michael Vick poster, but not real news.

If you dug the way a real journalist would, and did your duty as an editorial board, you would realize that all your story has accomplished is to further the smear campaign that this case was really about in the first place.

So shame on you R&B, shame on you.

Originally posted by

ryan

Shame on you R&B...

Originally posted by

Q-Dawg, PharmD

Sorry to hurt those of you out there who pride themselves on their test score (I got a 137 in case you were wondering, and before you tell me to check my facts before I write in). The test IS a joke. Don't believe me? Try taking the BPS board certification exams. That's what a real competency exam should be like. NAPLEX is the reason people in this profession are crying for a true competency exam. There are people out there who can pass this sham of a test who just don't belong. Though it may not have been his intention, and though he really hasn't done anything much different than any other review course (Think NABP doesn't miss the $300 they get for retests of failed students???), Flynn has shown the flaws in the system. A test that can be compromised by one individual soliciting people to memorize questions shows how much of a farce the exam truly is. There simply was not THAT many people taking this class... a lot, yes, but to have a bank of 2700 questions would require forever to build. It's a timed exam for God's sake. Who really is thinking about memorizing questions? How good must these people's memories be if the questions are "verbatim" on his computer? These aren't short questions we are talking about here. Crap questions, yes...short questions, no! This is utter BS from a money hungry, monopolistic company. This, and the new "License Transfer" policy (look at the fees just to apply through NABP...doesn't count actual state license fees and test fees!!!) from NABP just proves how much of a greedy company they truly are. It's not about Flynn, it's all about NABP's pocketbook. That's why they keep stressing how much it will cost to rewrite the exam.