There's a new admissions test in the mix, and I went straight to one of the people building it.

Scott Massey is a lead researcher on the PA-CAT. We talk about why it exists, what's on it, and what programs are hoping it does. The short version of the argument: the GRE was never designed to predict how someone does in a PA curriculum, and the PA-CAT is meant to test the science content you'd actually use.

Right now only some programs are using it, so this isn't a thing you need to panic about. But if you're applying in the next couple of cycles, check your program list and know whether it's required before you're surprised in June.

What we talk about:

• Why the PA-CAT was created
• How it's structured and what content it covers
• Comparing it to the GRE as a predictor
• Which programs are using it so far
• What this could mean for future applicants
• How to find out if a program requires it

Resources:

PA Program Map: https://www.thepaplatform.com/pa-platform-map

Free application timeline: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/free-application-timeline

CASPA GPA calculator: https://www.thepaplatform.com/pa-school-caspa-gpa-calculator

Pre-PA counseling: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/pre-pa-counseling

Mentioned in this episode:

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A few weeks ago, I talked about the PA cat, which is a new test that some schools are starting to implement for their PA school applications.

And now I have more information from one of the researchers.

So we just went to the source itself to get more info on this test.

Welcome to the Prepa Club podcast.

If you want to learn how to become a physician assistant, you're in the right place.

I'm your host, Savannah Perry.

Let's get to it.

Okay, so after I posted about the PA CAT and did kind of an initial podcast video and a podcast audio and video, I've still been getting a lot of questions about it.

And so I actually connected with the PA CAT people over that initial blog post and they offered to have one of their main researchers, who is also a PA come on and talk about the test, why they developed it, kind of the methods of developing it and everything basically that you need to know about this test to feel prepared and kind of understand where they're coming from.

So, you know, I, I guess the jury's still out, but I see the usefulness potentially of a tool like this, especially compared to the tools we currently have, which I don't think are very useful.

So we'll get into that once we get into the interview.

But a few things first and oh, thank you so much for listening.

My name is Savannah, by the way.

I am a dermatology PA and I also [email protected] so I would love to have you check that out.

If you did the personal statement course with me, I really hope you enjoyed it or are enjoying it if you're still in it.

And I would love to hear if you got your rough draft done or if you feel like that was helpful.

So if you didn't join, a few people have been kind of confused, but you can join at any time and you'll still get that two week email course to try to get a rough draft of your personal statement done.

And that's at the PA platform.

Really creative.

But all those links are in the description as well.

And then once you get it done, if you need help with editing, that's when you can reach out to MyPA Resource and use the code Future PA to make sure that you have a PA who's setting their eyes on your essay and giving you the feedback you need to make sure you're on the right track.

So a couple things that events that I want to talk about and I promise we're getting to the interview soon.

So this upcoming.

Well, first let's start With March, the Pre PA conference in Atlanta is sold out.

Currently.

We do have a waiting list, but we are very limited on space.

So that's why, I mean, we really didn't have a ton of tickets and they went really quickly.

So we hope to do more events like that.

And if there's somewhere you'd like to see a Pre PA conference, let us know.

We'll try to figure it out.

It is a huge undertaking to get something like that set up, but we're working on it currently.

But then in May, Nashville at AAPA, they are having a pre pa track and that will be on May 16, on Saturday, so be on the lookout.

There should be signups coming for that very, very soon.

And then if you can't go to that one in July, there is also a pre PA conference on July 25th, fifth in New Jersey.

So this is the one I went to last year, which was awesome.

It is at the College of St Elizabeth and they did a great job last year.

It went so smoothly for the first year and I'm even more excited about this year.

So I will be there again on July 25th.

We finally nailed that down.

And then there's also.

So for west coast people, in April, Journey to PA School puts on a prepa conference.

And I think a few of the schools do also, so be on the lookout on those.

I try to share on social media whenever I see these things come up.

And so just make sure you're following at the PA platform and yeah, we'll make sure that you kind of know what's going on.

All right, so before we jump into our interview, I also want to mention our other sponsor, PA School Prep, which is an online course to give you a refresher on anatomy, physiology and med terms before.

Before you start PA School to make sure you're prepared and ready to take it on.

We do not want you to be one of the people who drops out.

So if you feel like you need a little refresher or review on that, you can use the code Future PA there as well.

Also, on any of the services at the PA platform, future PA will get you a discount.

God, I'm saying so a lot today.

I apologize for that.

Let's jump in to our interview with Scott Massie.

You he will tell you a little bit about himself, but he is a pa.

He's an associate director at Central Michigan, and he also is a researcher.

So he has spent a lot of his PA career in researching education and trying to figure out how to make it better and more effective and making sure that the people who get accepted to PA school can finish it.

And that can actually be an issue sometimes.

So there's a lot that goes into this whole process.

But I think you'll enjoy this.

If you'd rather watch this interview, it is on YouTube.

Not all of them are, but this one is.

So I will.

We'll get to that now.

Thanks for listening.

You want me to start now?

Sure.

Okay.

So my name is Scott Massey.

I've been a PA for 36 years, been a PA educator for.

This is my 29th year.

And just to kind of make a long story short, you know, I've been in leadership positions in four PA programs.

I've also been an active researcher over the years in terms of presenting and publishing research, in particular about predictive factors for success in PE education.

So a couple of years ago, Exam Master had approached me.

Actually the executive of the Exam Master came to one of my presentations and asked me if I would be interested in participating in this exciting project which is developing and launching this PA admissions exam.

But he asked myself and Dr. Johnny Yaley to be the co investigators of this project as there will be about an 18 month research component for that.

So that's kind of like I won't go into everything else as far as my PA career.

You know, I've worked in numerous settings, including more emergency medicine than anything else.

But I worked in client practice, I worked internationally for a year and I've worked in several countries around the world participating in projects as well.

But you know, at this point in time I'm focusing on research and education and the other part of my time is spent working on this project.

So that's just kind of a summary.

Of me, a little bit of everything, but sounds good.

So yeah, I'm really interested and I'm going to be perfectly honest, I am not exactly sure what my thoughts are on the PA cat.

So I'm excited to learn more.

I think if I.

So I've been a PA for five years now and I think if I was in the pre PA shoes I would maybe be a little bit terrified.

But as someone who's kind of been through it and helped a lot of students through the process, I can see the benefits of a test that is designed like the PA CAT to be more specific than say the gre.

And so yeah, I'm excited to hear more and kind of see if it helps my thoughts on it a little bit more.

So you.

So it wasn't your idea, you just got involved.

Is that Safe to say I was.

Asked to be one of the principal investigators.

So, you know, when you launch something of that magnitude, there has to be some robust research.

So obviously we can't ethically, because this has to be approved by institutional review board, we can't ethically administer this exam to prepa students that in case it would provide any kind of like people would use it for any purpose other than, you know, basically making decisions.

So up until now, it's been in the research phase, and that will continue going forward as well.

As far as, like what you kind of mentioned about the concern of the pre PA students in terms of GRE versus PA CAT, I can tell you that honestly, as a PA educator, I haven't been involved with admissions now for 28 years that whatever tools PE educators are going to use that come to admit students, they're going to use.

So I've read virtually all the research that PE educators have done on the GRE predictive factors in the pans and success, and it's not strong.

So it's not a great.

It's not a great instrument.

So I guess the comment I would make to all those students would be is, do you want PA educators to use an instrument that's not very strong versus one that's going to be a better, I guess, identifier of students success in the PA program?

So there's nothing we can do to really allay their fears.

It's going to be a process, but we'll get into that more detail as you ask questions.

So is there, as of right now, with the standards we have, is there one factor in the application process that through the research you found to be the best predictor of success in a PA program?

You mean other than this instrument?

Right.

Like up until now, because the GRE is not.

So what is there something that.

And that's what I find.

So looking at applications and talking to students and I find it hard to help them to understand.

Like, schools have to standardize applicants to a degree because there's so much variety in where they're getting classes and experience.

Like, there has to be some way to even the playing field a little bit.

So what have schools used traditionally until this point to figure that out?

Well, I mean, unfortunately, they use science GPA a great deal.

And we just got the data from the research phase for this project which looks at several hundred students and their relationship to prerequisite science and the admission, like basically the first year of the PA program and the first year PAC grad, and the relationship between those variables were very, very weak.

And the published research shows that science gpa, which intuitively we would think that looking at EMP grades and performance and chemistry would be indicator.

It hasn't panned out.

I've done my own assessment, so I'm involved with a lot of assessment and I've assessed several years of data looking at here at Central, for example, looking at how well science GPA predicts pans performance in the academic performance, it's all negative adverse relationship, which means that it's not strong.

So PA educators are going to use that even though it's not a great predictor.

Interviews, I think interpersonal things are also probably one of the more important things.

Trying to identify that using MMIs, we use these group interviews, personal interviews.

I think looking at personal statements are important.

So there's like the qualitative type of variables that programs will use, then there's the quantitative.

And then 51% of the PA programs as of last year were using green.

So they're using GRE as part of that formula.

So they're plugging that into a spreadsheet and saying, okay, here's the score in the gre.

We're going to give the student X number of points.

So that's kind of what's happened.

And you know, it's not an exact science to admit students.

And I'm the first to tell you that my whole career has been about student success because I've worked with students who failed PAMs, I've worked with students who failed trying to remediate, trying to develop better remediation tools.

And at the end of the day, not every student who applies is able to handle PA school.

So it's our moral and ethical responsibility to not admit a student that's not going to be successful.

So it's a tough job that we in PA education have.

So.

Yeah.

Okay, so what are the end points and end goals that the.

Are you calling it the PA cat?

Right?

I want to make sure I'm saying that.

Right.

That you're looking for with the PA.

Cat, the end goals.

Can you be more specific?

Like you mean end goal variables?

Yeah.

So is it seeing a better performance on pants?

Better GPAs in PA school?

Less loss of matriculation?

Like what?

I guess.

How do you figure out if it's effective?

You know, I believe that the Best way to find out if it's effective is to see a slight decrease in attrition.

You know, whether a student gets, say, 450 in pins or 500 in pins, I could care less.

You know what I mean?

But the attrition rate in PA programs ranges from virtually zero and some that only accept students that are in the top 10% of GPAs to much higher in programs that are trying to admit candidates that come from disadvantaged backgrounds, those kinds of things.

So if this tool, at the end of the day, lowers some attrition, then that will be successful.

So it's really about student success.

It's basically, to me, it's the best tool in the arsenal that will probably be available to programs to look at cognitive factors.

Again, only one piece.

So the other thing I'll say is that some programs that have a mission to admit students that might even get lower scores on this exam can still use this exam to try to identify those that need a prematriculation type of program as well.

So it can have multiple uses.

So, yeah.

Yeah, that's interesting.

Okay, so can you even compare the PA CAT to the gre?

Not really, because it's testing different types of skills.

I mean, you know, it's a verbal, quantitative.

I mean, I think there's some overlap in the quantitative, but because there's some, you know, there's some statistics and there's some chemistry, et cetera.

But for the most part, it's really testing basic science knowledge, social science knowledge.

It's most closely aligned with the Pharmacy cat.

There's a pharmacy college admissions test during the development phase.

The committees look at the Pharmacy CAT because that was probably the closest aligned exam that already existed.

The mcat, which has undergone some evolution, is also basically testing the same thing.

So it's testing the typical undergraduate courses that PA students will already take.

And it already.

It also is not assuming that students have very advanced, say, biological science courses.

So it's not meant to look at like, well, you gotta have, you have molecular biology, you have to have this and that.

It's based on the average GPA or, sorry, the average prerequisites of all PA students in the country.

So we did a very large assessment of that to make sure that we're not over testing content that's beyond the scope of what PA students are experiencing.

Okay.

I have, I listed out the subjects on my website.

There's a lot of them, so I don't know if you want to list them, but we could either direct people there if you want.

To go through them.

You can.

But I want to know a little bit more logistics of the test, like how long is it, how's it scored, that type of thing.

Okay, so first of all, how long is it?

The exam is going to be 225 questions.

Okay.

And during the launch this year, 25 of those questions are going to be what's called field test questions.

And up until like the nccpa, for example, I was a previous writer at Grant ccpa, so I know this stuff.

Some of the questions in the hand when it was 360 questions was field test questions.

Only 300 questions were used to actually score it, and now it's only 300 questions.

So 25 questions will be field test questions and then the 200 questions will actually be scored and it'll be based on the one minute per question framework.

As far as the scale, the scale process is very similar to what the PAC grant uses.

I'm not sure.

I'm sure you're familiar with that.

So you're using scaled scores.

Okay.

And the scaled scores basically is all the students in the country.

The lowest score might be 200.

The top score might be 800.

Actually, NCCPA uses the same concept.

So you start with that framework and then the students will find out where they score in terms of their percentile.

So if they scored higher than 61% of all people, they'll be a 61.

If they scored higher than 2% of the population, it'll be 2.

So there'll be total scaled percentile scores and sub scores, which we're combining the sub scores, the biological sciences, A and P, chemistry and social sciences.

Okay, cool.

Is there any, I guess with it being so new, is there any way to give someone like this is the score you should shoot for that schools be looking for or.

We don't know yet.

Not yet.

Excuse me.

So it's going to take probably several years to get to that point.

And you know, for example, I'll use the analogy of the pac rat, which has been used now for 20 years in PE education.

There's research out there that looks at a score in the pac rat.

And if the pre PA people look my name up, they'll see that I published some stuff.

But PAC grad doesn't say, this is the score for you.

You research it, you look at the data.

The same thing here.

It's going to take time.

Now, each year applicants will be compared against the other applicants.

So it's not going to be like, here's a score.

Programs on the other hand, just like they do now, will take that data, and they'll begin to identify basically in their program how those scores relate to their performance.

Because you can't generalize all PA programs.

They're different in some ways.

And they'll also look at the relationship of the PA CAT with the PAC grad in those programs, the EORs in that program, and then the pans.

So like any instrument, it'll take time to get to that point.

The PAC RAT is being administered, or the psychometrician that we use is what's called a Rasch specialist.

Rasch is kind of that framework where you're developing, you know, a scale and you're looking at basically performance within a group.

So we're not looking at all the people who ever taken the exam.

We're looking at the students in that year and that in that testing window which took the exam.

Okay, do you see this?

I know you said every school kind of uses their own parameters.

I mean, do you see this as something that could potentially replace the GRE or become something that's mandated and required for every single PA school?

No admissions exam can be mandated unless the program wants to.

Okay.

So, I mean, I've been asked the question, you know, does paea, for example, like, condone or whatever?

PAEA is neutral.

Like, they don't.

PAEA doesn't say, well, GRE is better than MCAT versus, you know, so programs are using gre, Casper, and some programs are using mcat.

Even so, programs will choose to adopt this exam, and they'll choose to use it in their cycle and gather that data and require it for their applicants.

Okay, so something you're making available.

It's available.

Okay.

I've seen it popping up a little bit that some programs are starting to implement the PA CAT for this upcoming cycle.

Is there a number of programs or.

We're not going to know until May 1st.

The total number there's estimated about a dozen, I think, right now are pretty sure.

But there may be as many as another 10 to 15 beyond that.

So it might be 25 or 30.

So the first year, I think the expectation was, is that it might be 25 or 30 programs.

And then upcoming years, it's really going to be grassroots.

I mean, as people use it as the word spreads, I mean, I think all the PE educators in the country have heard about, you know, this exam because there's been, like, for example, webinars that I've participated in and information given to all PE educators.

So they know about it and they'll choose to select it.

So I don't have a crystal ball to tell you what percentage of programs will use it in the future, but I think it'll probably grow.

Yeah, I agree.

What, what is going to be the cost of the test?

And then I've gotten.

I know you all have a lot of questions about cost and that being a limiting factor.

Are there fee waivers available?

What does that look like?

So let me get to the cost first.

The cost of the actual exam is $149.

When students register, they're also going to be paying the prometric testing fee of the same kind of.

So it's important to realize that the total cost will be $228.

It's comparable to the GRE.

So that's the cost as far as fee waivers.

Right now, Exam Master is developing a program to support economically disadvantaged students.

So they're connecting with various constituency groups.

I know that the executive director is talking to the president of aapa, trying to reach out to see how that can be done.

State chapters, and certainly that's the desire, if students are challenged economically, to be able to have like a scholarship program and offer it free of charge.

And I honestly don't know how much that's happening with the current exams, like, for example, GRE or Casper or whatever.

But that's the intent of the Exam Master is to provide waivers.

Okay, and then how does it work?

Will they be able to send their scores directly?

Like, I know when you do the gre, you get to send it to three schools at the test for free or.

And then you can send more later.

Is it similar set up to that?

It is.

So when students take the exam.

So basically when they register, there'll be articulation with CASPA and in which the number of programs they apply to the CASPA would then forward the scores.

And it's a process, but I can't tell you how exactly how it's transmitted, but it'll be the same process that GRE uses.

There's going to be a school code and it'll be able to be available for candidates.

There's going to be like a transcript too, that each student can download of their exam.

And programs will get transcripts of each applicant's who applied their program.

So, yes, that's the way it's going to work.

Okay, cool.

Okay.

Another question that I've gotten a little bit is people who have seen that these schools they're applying to want them to take the PA CAT now and they're unsure of how to prepare because, you know, if you go.

When I was studying for the gre, I went to the library, checked out five books, took all these practice tests, you know, so how can people actually study and prepare?

And, you know, we're all type A and need to be.

Of course, so am I. I understand that clearly.

So first of all, I would say that preparation is not going to be necessarily as robust as looking at slide, not preparing for GRE because it's a different kind of exam.

So students will get, you know, review books for that.

And the more that you practice those exam questions, the better you will do test retest phenomenon.

Because the exam is based upon the typical undergraduate courses, Exam Master now has a downloadable document which is like the outline of the exam.

So students can basically go to their own content that they have their own, say, for example, textbooks and use that as a guide.

So basically it's similar to that whether or not they want to buy some more truncated review manuals for biology and ap that up to them.

There's also going to be, as part of the payment, a free practice exam which students will be able to go on and take.

And that will give them an estimation of their scaled score.

So if they go ahead and they take the practice exam and it says we might score 450, which is lower, then that will give them indication they're going to have to probably do a little more study.

And I can tell you that the outline is fairly detailed as far as its taxonomy, they can go into chemistry and review the concepts.

And I think that depending upon when students have taken some of the courses, I know that many students by the time they get to their senior year and they're applying to PA school, it's been three years since they've taken in organic chemistry, so there may be topics they have to go back and maybe spend a little more time focusing on.

But because the concentration of the exam is a little bit less for chemistry then, say, biology and angular physiology, it's not going to have as much of an impact on the scaled score as the other components.

Okay, so there are some guidance.

Last time I checked the website, it wasn't up yet, but I'll link to that so everyone can find it and feel a little bit more reassured.

But yeah, okay, I think.

I mean, I think we've pretty much covered all of my questions.

Are there any other questions that y' all are getting regularly or.

Let me look, because we're looking at blogs a little bit and let me see if there's some concerns that come up.

I've got y' all on Instagram.

Yeah.

Let's see.

How heavily weighted will it be used in the application process?

That is depending.

That's the program's prerogative.

You know, I'll tell you that the programs that have adopted so far are using it as one component.

So like I mentioned before about, say, let's say if you look at all the points, gpa, interview, essay, everything, healthcare experience, everything, and then you have the PA CAT that will be counted as one of the variables.

So, like, some programs might use the percentile and say students that get in this percentile will get X number of points, so whatever they choose to use.

So that's kind of.

So it's going to depend on how it's weighted.

And some programs are doing a watch and see approach, meaning that because it's relatively new, they're going to gather it, they're going to analyze the data and see in their program how it's working.

So I think that that process is always going to be kind of like a cautionary.

Like any new instrument.

The other concern I've seen kind of crop up is it's being implemented under people's feet, basically, as they're, you know, they're studying for the Jerry now they got to take the.

And the process of putting a new requirement for an applicant, you know, is based on, like, if it's early in the cycle, something like an exam is pretty permissible to include.

And that is like before it's, you know, months before the application is due.

That's kind of like how programs will look at it.

They will put it on their website.

That means that they're applying for that program.

They'll know ahead of time.

You know, it's not like we're implementing a new class.

So I think applicants have to realize that individual programs have the prerogative of requiring various kinds of elements for their students.

So same thing here.

And I think I've spoken to a few directors that are choosing to make it voluntary this year and kind of facing it in.

Are any programs, do you think, going to require both the PA CAT and the GRE or is that overkill?

I don't know that to be poor.

Everybody that I've spoken to and what I hear now in our committee is that they're choosing to basically go to PA CAD and eliminate gre.

I personally eliminated GRE at Central three years ago.

But again, I think the cost of students has to be concerning if you're requiring both exams.

There was a comment I think I covered this in terms of wanting to reduce attrition.

There was one comment that says, well, the PAM score is already high.

Why do you need another instrument?

And I'm just going to go back to the one thing I said before, is that if this instrument helps overall to reduce some attrition in PA students, then it's worth it.

And so I think the message I would like to give to the prepa the applicants is that this is about trying to ensure success.

It's not about trying to eliminate people or put more barriers for applicants.

It's about ensuring that the people who are in programs have a higher probability of succeeding.

And they also got to realize too, is that when you take 5% to 10% attrition in programs across the United States, we're talking hundreds of people that are being dismissed from programs across the country.

So if that's lowered, it's worth it.

I completely agree.

And I think sometimes too it's difficult from say a pre PA standpoint when you haven't been to PA school yet and even people have been there.

So my class, we started with 44, ended up with 40, and one person that graduated in my class never passed pants.

And that's, I mean it's a, it sounds small, four or five people, but for those people, that's life changing.

And so if I think if there's something that could have prevented them or kind of indicated that maybe they weren't going to be able to succeed in PA school, that would have been helpful for them in the long run.

And I also add that, you know, many PA programs, myself included, will look at like any predictive variables where students might need more remediation along the way.

So if you look at that, I mean, what some programs do is they look at applicants that get, say, lower scores in some classes and they should intervene and say, okay, what do the students need?

Do they need study skills?

Do they need more support?

Sometimes it's a number of things, you know, like again, you know, having sat down with many students struggling in the first semester, sometimes it's just studying skills and they have to adjust.

But sometimes it's science knowledge and science aptitude or the ability to handle the fast pace of a program.

So even if it's looked at this way is that if their score is lower and the program's student, it kind of puts them on the radar that people need some support, maybe they need some more intervention.

And I know I brought the concept of the prematureculation concept before.

I mean, some medical schools do this.

They admit candidates that have say lower MCAT scores and they require they come in and do a pre matriculation like review process.

So I think it opens the door for some of those things too.

Not just like well I'm not going to admit you to the program because.

Your score is X. Yeah just more information the better.

I think that's great.

Where can people find out more about the PA Cat, ask their questions, all that good stuff.

Go to the pakat website pakat.com.

I feel like I'm in a commercial here and I think the websites have built up pretty well now.

I mean the resources are up.

I mean you just have to kind of navigate.

I think it's very user friendly so and that should answer a lot of questions that people have.

All right, well we'll definitely get them connected.

Thank you so much for your time.

You're welcome.

Okay, have a good day.