Objective. To describe grittiness of students from three pharmacy schools and determine if grit is associated with academic performance measures. Methods. Pharmacy students completed an electronic questionnaire that included the Short Grit Scale (Grit-S). Associations were determined using logistic regression. Results. Grit-S total score was a significant and independent predictor for participants who reported a GPA $3.5, and Consistency of Interest (COI) and Perseverance of Effort (POE) domain scores were significantly higher compared to participants with a GPA of 3.0-3.49. Participants reporting a D or F had slightly lower average total Grit-S scores and COI domain scores compared to participants who did not. In addition, the group who reported a GPA ,3.0 had lower scores in the POE domain compared to those with a GPA of 3.0-3.4. Conclusion.Grittiness may be associated with student pharmacist academic performance and the Grit-S Scale may have substantive implications for use in pharmacy programs.

Objective. To determine the effect of 3 variations in test item format on item statistics and student performance. Methods. Fifteen pairs of directly comparable test questions were written to adhere to (standard scale) or deviate from (nonstandard scale) 3 specific item-writing guidelines. Differences in item difficulty and discrimination were measured between the 2 scales as a whole and for each guideline individually. Student performance was also compared between the 2 scales. Results. The nonstandard scale was 12.7 points more difficult than the standard scale ( p50.03). The guideline to avoid "none of the above" was the only 1 of the 3 guidelines to demonstrate significance. Students scored 53.6% and 41.3% ( p,0.001) of total points on the standard and nonstandard scales, respectively. Conclusions. Nonstandard test items were more difficult for students to answer correctly than the standard test items, provided no enhanced ability to discriminate between higher-and lower-performing students, and resulted in poorer student performance. Item-writing guidelines should be considered during test construction.

Objective. To describe the implementation and effect of an emergency preparedness laboratory activity on student knowledge, willingness to participate in emergency preparedness training, current level of preparedness, and the importance of a pharmacist's role in disaster response. Design. Second-year pharmacy students in the infectious disease module participated in a laboratory activity based on a basic disaster response tabletop exercise format. Three case-based scenarios involving infectious diseases were created by participating faculty members. Assessment. Surveys before and after the laboratory were used to assess the activity's effect on student knowledge, willingness to participate in emergency preparedness training, current level of preparedness, and the importance of a pharmacist's role in disaster response. In addition, the postsurvey assessed student perceptions of the activity's success at accomplishing faculty-specified outcomes from Appendix B of the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education's (ACPE) Standards. Conclusion. Implementation of an emergency response laboratory activity may improve overall students' knowledge of, confidence in, and understanding of their role as pharmacists in an emergency response, while incorporating a variety of skills and knowledge outcomes.Keywords: emergency preparedness, disaster response, education, tabletop exercise, lab INTRODUCTIONThere are numerous types of disasters, natural and human. Natural disasters are physical events that occur spontaneously in nature, and can be geophysical (earthquakes), hydrological (floods), meteorological (hurricanes), climatological (temperature extremes), or biological (viral epidemics).1,2 Human disasters are man-made events that include chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive terrorism, arson, riots, armed conflicts, and infrastructure failures.1,2 Any of these disasters most likely will involve provision of health care as part of the greater disaster response effort. Health care professionals may have to address treating injuries directly related to the disaster, providing mental health counseling for survivors, maintaining or re-establishing control of chronic diseases, or preventing infectious diseases outbreaks. Considering the unpredictable nature of disasters, community health professionals should be prepared to respond to disaster events when they occur.Public health emergency preparedness is defined as "the capability of the public health and health care systems, communities, and individuals, to prevent, protect against, quickly respond to, and recover from health emergencies, particularly those whose scale, timing, or unpredictability threatens to overwhelm routine capabilities."3 Acquiring this level of preparedness requires continuous preparation and execution of emergency response activities that examine performance and improve identified deficiencies. 3The 2014 Ebola outbreak demonstrated weaknesses in and the need for better public health emergency preparedness among health care workers. 4...

This commentary, written primarily by a recent pharmacy graduate, discusses the impact of COVID-19 on the class of 2020. Everyone has been impacted by COVID-19, but pharmacy students have been affected by and experienced COVID-19 in unique ways. This was the first class to complete pharmacy practice experiences in an online format, miss out on milestone events including graduation, and face uncertainty about becoming licensed and entering the job market in the midst of a pandemic. However, instead of discouraging them, these events have in many ways strengthened the resilience of the class of 2020. Additionally, COVID-19 has highlighted the importance of continued advocacy for the profession and articulation of the pharmacist's expanded role and value to the health care team, and inspired the class of 2020 to join the ranks of colleagues nationwide in raising awareness in these areas. Nevertheless, uncertainty over their future and that of their peers lingers as COVID-19 has forever changed pharmacy education and practice.