The Australian Pharmacy Council (APC) announced a redesign of the Knowledge Assessment of Pharmaceutical Sciences (KAPS) exam, replacing it with the Overseas Pharmacist Readiness Assessment (OPRA™) exam from March 2025.
This initiative underscores APC’s unwavering commitment to contemporary exam design and delivery practices, ensuring that their exams remain current, valid, and aligned with Australian pharmacy practice.
The KAPS exam is the exam that most overseas trained pharmacists wishing to practise in Australia must pass as part of registration journey.
Key changes of the redesign are to the methodology that APC uses for the selection and scoring of questions, a revision of the content areas, and a reduced exam duration. This is following recommendations of a working group engaged in 2021 to review the KAPS exam specifications.
The last KAPS exam will be held in November 2024, with the OPRA™ exam beginning in March 2025. There is no change to the candidate eligibility process and registration process, or validity period of results.
Informed by evidence-based psychometric methodologies
The APC engages expert psychometricians to analyse the statistical performance of questions and to set the standard for their exams. They have been using the Rasch model to select and score questions for the Intern Written and CAOP exam since 2020. Now, the OPRA™ exam also uses the Rasch model.
“This ensures our exam design continues to be robust and uses a defensible method to determine candidate ability. By adopting the Rasch methodology for the OPRA™ exam we are aligning our exam products and providing a shorter, more targeted assessment, as advised by contemporary exam design experts,” states APC CEO, Bronwyn Clark.
Revised content areas
The exam now has a stronger focus on therapeutics and the application of knowledge to align with evolving pharmacy practice within Australia. This provides candidates with a contemporary and comprehensive assessment of their knowledge and skills, enabling them to commence an internship in Australia, as part of their journey to becoming registered.
Shorter exam duration
These changes have enabled APC to reduce the exam to a single paper. The cost of the OPRA™ exam will be AU$2190. This is a reduction from the current KAPS exam cost.
“We have made a commitment to ongoing quality assurance in assessment methodologies. Our approach to assessment is evidence-based and agile to meet future needs. We have aligned our exams to best practice in design to ensure that each question continues to accurately assess candidate knowledge,” said Ms Clark.
“I am proud to work for an organisation that embraces opportunities to innovate, whilst always assuring the highest quality in pharmacy education and assessment,” Ms Clark concluded.
The APC will continue to work with subject matter experts to write, edit and review exam questions. The APC also commissioned a full-scale pilot for OPRA™ with their delivery partners to test all operating systems to ensure a smooth candidate experience.
The APC has developed a new exam guide and sample paper to support candidates to prepare for the OPRA™ exam. Learn more about the OPRA™ exam.
