title: Identifying themes within a medical school admission committee's reviews of applicants.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Admissions committees attempt to select the most qualified applicants based on many cognitive and "noncognitive" factors.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  Identify common themes cited in the admissions committee member summaries of medical school matriculants and determine the relative frequency and importance of these themes.
  
  
  METHODS
  After reviewing a convenience sample of 150 reviewer comments, 14 qualitative themes were identified. Utterances (thematic word strings) from each of the three reviewer comments for each matriculant for 7 academic years (1989-1996) were then categorized and coded as being positive, negative, or neutral. Intra-rater and inter-rater reliabilities were calculated.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Utterances (n = 9299) about 981 matriculants were categorized by theme and sorted as being positive, neutral, or negative. Intra-rater reliabilities were excellent (mean K = 0.98, range 0.90-1.00). Similarly, inter-rater reliabilities were also excellent (mean K = 0.94, range 0.55-1.00 and mean K = 0.90, range 0.08-1.00). Four themes (overall summarizing comments, academic, test scores, and motivation) accounted for more than half (56%) of the utterances.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  We were able to qualitatively identify themes and provide information about how one committee weighs both cognitive and "noncognitive" factors. Admission committees should consider reexamining their process and potentially expanding, eliminating, or modifying application components.
authors.affiliation: F. Edward Hébert School of Medicine, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, 4301 Jones Bridge Road, Bethesda, MD 20814, USA.
authors.forename: William R
authors.initials: WR
authors.lastname: Gilliland
authors.forename: Anthony R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Artino
authors.forename: Donna M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Waechter
authors.forename: John E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: McManigle
authors.forename: David F
authors.initials: DF
authors.lastname: Cruess
authors.forename: Margaret
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Calloway
authors.forename: Bonnie C
authors.initials: BC
authors.lastname: Arze
authors.forename: Steven J
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Durning
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D003657:Decision Making; D004504:Education, Medical, Undergraduate; D006801:Humans; D012570:School Admission Criteria / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012577:Schools, Medical; D013337:Students, Medical; D055815:Young Adult