Author response.(Commentary on "Use of Demographic and Quantitative Admissions Data ...")

Publication: Physical Therapy

Publication Date: 01-SEP-07

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COPYRIGHT 2007 American Physical Therapy Association, Inc.

We found Sandstrom's comments to be an insightful contribution to a dialogue as the profession grapples with how best to prepare professional physical therapist students for safe and effective practice. Academic physical therapy admissions committees have a daunting task, as Sandstrom implies in his commentary. Committees have to balance societal needs and program objectives with the knowledge that students must meet rigorous academic demands. As our studies (1,2 suggest, only a small portion of the variance in students' success, which we defined as the avoidance of academic difficulty or passing the National Physical Therapy Examination (NPTE) on the first attempt, was explained by the variables we studied. A majority of the variance for either favorable outcome was left unexplained despite the use of several demographic, quantitative academic- and program-level variables. There is no question that there are many challenges to making defensible admissions decisions. Given these challenges, we believe that our reports have expanded our understanding of the potential role that...

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