Abstract:

At the Universitat de Barcelona, the subject of Physiology and Pathophysiology III is taught in the fifth semester of Pharmacy Degree. In September 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the students of this subject alternated one week of face-to-face classes with one week of on-line-synchronic classes in order to diminish the number of students in the classroom. Due to a worsening of the situation, this teaching model lasted only three weeks and thereafter all the students followed on-line-synchronic classes. However, the evaluation was maintained face-to-face, and four different exams were performed, namely, two midterm tests, a practical exam and one final exam. For each test, the students were distributed at different times and classrooms in order to fulfil the security measures established by the Universitat de Barcelona. These measures included open windows and doors of the classroom, control of assistance by a QR code, students and teachers with mask (FFP-2 or surgical), hydro alcoholic gel before entering and leaving the classroom, and most importantly, students separated by a distance > 1.5 metres. The day of the final exam, the students answered a survey designed to capture the degree of their satisfaction about the development of these exams.

Respect to the results of the survey, a 61 % of the students valued positively to attend the midterm tests at the university, whereas only a 36 % valued positively to carry out the final exam face-to-face. It has to be taken into account that the final exam was in the month of January, when the situation of the pandemic had worsened. In the regard to the practical exam, most of the students, an 81 %, positively considered performing it face-to-face. Regarding the security measures applied in the exams, a 65 % of the students valued them positively.

Concerning the results of the evaluation, a 76.5 % of the students passed the subject, obtaining the following qualifications, a 43.3 % pass, a 28.5 % remarkable and a 4.7 % with honours. The results were quite similar to those obtained in the previous academic term, when this subject was taught under normal conditions from September 2019 to January 2020. In that case, a 78 % of the students passed the subject, with a 50.2 % of the students obtaining pass, a 24 % remarkable, 1 % outstanding and 2.9 % with honours.

To conclude, the situation of the pandemic has required a special effort from teachers but also and more importantly from students, who have been forced to follow most of the classes on-line. However, in our subject, with face-to-face exams, they have obtained similar results as the students from the previous year. Regarding their opinions, with the exception of the final exam that was scheduled in a very complicated period of the pandemic, the students valued positively attending most of the exams face-to-face.

Keywords:

Evaluation, on-line-synchronic classes, face-to-face exams, COVID-19 pandemic.