How are students graded/evaluated in medical school?
Again, depends on the school. Many schools still have the standard A/B/C/D/F scale of grading. The rest go on the pass/fail scale or some variation of it. Many schools have an “honors” grade which reflects performance in an upper percentile of the class for that course. The grading scale can change as you advance in your studies. For example, some schools have letter grades the first two years and then pass/fail grades the last two (or letter grades the first three and pass/fail the last year only). The grades themselves are objective the first two years – based almost entirely on written exams, oral exams, and practical (or lab) exams. In the third and fourth years, grades depend in large part on evaluations by other members of your hospital team – the attending physician(s), the resident(s) and/or the intern(s). There are also written/oral exams in the last two years, and the relative importance of exams vs. evaluations varies greatly from rotation to rotation.
